After putting on a very successful class of roughly 120 attendees on Wednesday about ways Realtors can defend their value and commissions charged to their clients (See Defending Your Value: Explaining the Services you Provide your Clients) , I figured I would post a little follow up information.

The speaker, Phil Querin, brought up a good point in that a lot of the Realtor Associations are starting to run campaigns targeted to the consumer touching on what value Realtors actually provide their clients. He mentioned one example of the Orlando Regional Realtor Association having a document on their site that lists 183 value added actions, steps, processes and review stages. Even though this is all the way accross the country, the concepts are the same and I think this is something every agent should at least take a look at. For your viewing pleasure, here is the document. Throw this in your listing presentation, and you shouldn't have anyone ask "What do you do that justifies charging me 6%?" anymore.

PMAR, Portland Metro Association of Realtors has a similar campaign on their homepage, but it's not quite as in-depth. It only lists 11 reasons to use a Realtor. Check it out, you might find something useful.


My personal favorite: (Thanks to FoREM for the good find)



The Canadian Real Estate Association has created a great site that combines flash and live video (if that's what you'd call it) to convey the same message to consumers. HowRealtorsHelp.com is a very crafty way of engaging the consumer and getting the end message across. I don't know too many home sellers or buyers that would actually sit and read 183 reasons to use a Realtor. I didn't even read them all! But, I found myself on this website for far longer than I would have expected. It's truly a work of art!

Anyway, I look forward to seeing some more positive steps from the R/E Associations around the country. If you see any others that are worth a look, let me know.

Jeff