Why is Your Real Estate Client Calling Me?

We have a transaction going on right now in which one of the team leaders, Grace, is selling her own house, and the Buyer Agent is asking Grace to do the Buyer Agent's job.

The Buyer Agent (BA) could not drive across town to review the contract with the buyers and get their signatures on the offer, so she asked Grace to do it for her.  Grace said to the BA, "I'm paying you a $21,000 commission.  You can drive over here and meet your clients."

The BA called one hour prior to the home inspection and said she would not be attending the inspection, and asked Grace to supervise the inspection.  Grace said, "I am leaving the house now.  Your clients and the inspector will be at the front door in an hour, waiting to get inside.  They will be waiting for you to lit them in.  I urge you to be here in an hour", then hung up the phone.  The BA showed up.  Ater the home inspection, the BA sent the list of repairs to Grace and asked her to write the home inspection repairs addendum.  Grace said, "You have three hours until the home inspection contingency expires.  I urge you to write up an addendum to protect your clients.  The BA wrote up the addendum the next day, after the contingency expired.  Grace said to the BA, "Well, I guess YOU will be paying for the repairs." 

The buyers didn't understand the difference between a title company and an attorney.  The buyers wanted to use their attorney to close the sale.  The attorney called Grace with a dozen questions about the title search.  Grace said, "I'll bet this is your first real estate settlement".  The attorney said, "Yes".  Grace said, "All of the things you asked about are old issues that were handled in previous settlements.  Where will you get a title insurance policy?"  Attorney said, "The other agent said YOU would be getting the title insurance policy".  Grace said, "Oh really.  The buyer pays for the title insurance, but the listing agent supposedly obtains it?  How is that protecting the Buyer Agent's client?  You may do as you please, but I urge you to pass this to a title company, and make an arrangement to attend the settlement with the buyers as their counsel".

Those are just a few examples.

I've had this happen often. I try to keep an open mind and not automatically blame the agent. Often it's the customer. These days it seems everyone wants immediate attention. Often it's just a matter of they didn't reach their agent and won't wait for a call back. I've often had people call on listings and when I ask "When do you want to see it" the answer is "Right Now. We're parked in front of the house". When I tell them I can't come right now but would be happy to set an appointment for later they usually get angry that I can't or won't drop everything and rush over. Bye Felicia.

Excellent advice on handling these situations.   Unfortunately, it happens at the other end of the country (Virginia) too.   It also happens to lenders when they have clients calling about those agents.   When it happens, I revert back to my mantra "Be a Professional".

Boy these are extreme cases. Never had anything like you've had.

WOW!  Once again, my hat goes off to Realtors/Brokers for the challenges that you face.

Randy, thank you for "staying in the light" and resisting the temptation to bad mouth, etc. You are doing the right thing! And I'm sure ethic policies in place are being followed! BRAVO!

My professional policy as a home stager is always to support the Realtor/Broker who uses my staging services and to also "stay in the light" in my positive communication with the Homeowner, etc!  No to "dark thinking!!"

I actually posed a question to a caller on one of my listings if they thought they had hired the wrong agent? When asked why, I shared that my clients are made to feel as if they are the only ones I have. Then asked, "Do you feel that way"? and caller became offended (by toneality). Must have made them uncomfortable, and therefore struck a nerve. Dont believe I crossed any forbidden lines, just planted some seeds.

This is great, Randy.  I had one couple that worked with me for months.  I showed them everything and anything and I was always responsive.  On one of our last tours, I stopped at one of the properties on the list and the wife informed me that they saw it yesterday.  WHAT?  Well, apparently her dad became involved with their search due to the fact that he was a real estate agent a long time ago......etc.  In their case, it was forgivable.  Nobody wants to argue with Dad!  LOL

What we have here is a failure to communicate.

Good evening Randy Prothero,

Interesting challenges you have been faced with because there has been lack of communication between clients and agents. You are handling these scenarios like a professional! Good job.

Great ways to handle the situation as the agent, and great advice to buyers/sellers on handling concerns with their agents. :0)

Timely post for me.  A great list of what a person should do if this happens to them.  A buyer called me day before yesterday telling me he still wanted the house but that he wanted one more repair done than we were willing to do.  What the heck?!  Sometimes we agents have to take over to keep things together and luckily this one worked.  Great post!

Generally this does not happen if you educate your client well and maintain good contact.  I have had my clients reach out to the other agent on a couple of occasions.  I will say the issue was my clients, not me or the other parties.  They just did not like the answers I was giving them on some things and just felt their winning personalities would get them what they wanted from the other side.  It did not work.

When you (and I mean not AR people, because you all would never) ignore me, my calls, texts and emails, my client may call you because they are frustrated.  Other than that,  my guys won't be calling.   I guess  that's a topic for another blog.

I hope that some day the powers that be step in and make it so that those sorts of agents aren't in our business any more.  They drag us all down.

I was sitting in a restaurant and had someone I know well come up to me and let me know they were buying a new home!  The person said that she had a bunch of realtors mad at her. She would inquire about homes on zillow and whoever called to show her the house she would meet. Many houses and many realtors later, she finally bought one. She went to the selling agent to make the offer.  I learned that she had no idea what she was doing! I am sure the agent who showerd her the home will be looking for a commission. I am not getting in the middle of that mess! YIKES!

On Mililani, HI Real Estate discussions, call on Randy Prothero at (808) 384-5645, today, with eXp Realty.

Randy - we seem to be seeing some of that too. I have people calling me on listings that aren't even mine and want me to show it to them. When I ask if they have an agent, they proceed to tell me their agent is busy or only available weekends or certain times and want us to show them a home. It's crazy. 

Hi,

I think some of these broker are watching too much TV.  I was noticing on some of the reality TV shows, that brokers were meeting with each other's clients and other crazy stuff.  I was saying to myself "we don't do business like that!!"  Great post.

~Elizabeth Mosley, NC

Excellent list of what to do/not do. I've had a few occasions myself where that has happened and believe I did what you recommend, or at least I tried.

Congratulations on your feature recognition. This is good reading for home sellers and listing agents.