Because I just suddenly see things happen without researching the WHYs and HOWs ..........Mostly because I'm just busy carrying on business and don't stop often enough to investigate the changes, here is something I thought you can all explain to me.
Years ago (and still to this day) we, as Realtors, learned that "steering" is not a practice we would want to take on.........we could lose our licenses, and worse, not be looking out for the BEST interest of our clients.
That being said......WHY do I suddenly notice with a LOT of listings the phrase "INTERESTED BUYERS MUST BE PRE APPROVED BY XYZ Mortgage company (BANK). Now I'm not referring to only foreclosure properties, because that I can understand if that particular bank owns the property. But, it appears that everyone is doing it now. It's obvious to me (and I'm sure to the public and real estate commission) that these real estate agents have some kind of relationship to this mortgage company or bank. Take certain Big name RE companies.........they even have their own (with the same name) Loan officers sitting there.
Recently, I had a buyer who wanted to put an offer on a house and who's credit, income, etc. was very good. They had done their own shopping for a mortgage and had settled on who they liked the best. They had a pre-approval (actually is was an actual approval - subject to appraisal). The listing agent told me that she would advise her seller's not to consider the offer without HER mortgage guy speaking to the buyers and running his own check on them. My buyer's refused to talk to him and were very mad about the way this was taking place.
I told the agent that because she was insisting on this, I wanted to meet and present the offer myself to her sellers (which she was not in favor of, and said that her seller's didn't want that). I told her that her seller's needed to be aware of the fact that my buyers are ready to move on to another house because of her insistence of forcing them to talk to her mortgage company. Since the buyer's were offering close to list price on a house that has been on the market for so long, AND were "financially" excellent buyers, with approval in hand..................she (and her companies policies) were not acting in the best interest of the sellers.
Her manager called me and told me that it was something that all their seller's felt good and secure about......making sure the prospective buyer was qualified by their XYZ mortgage company. And that because my buyer's were refusing to participate it sends up a red flag. I explained all of this to my buyer's and they said "They just want to see if they can swing us to their mortgage company. We have an approval, and they can call and verify with our current loan officer, anything they want to find out (even see a copy of our credit report).
At this point, the buyer's had become so mad about this, they decided to look elsewhere for a house. A week later the agent called me and said "OK, I'm sure my homeowners would accept the offer"........and I said "Too late"!!
I am well aware (as with my own listings) that we all want to MAKE SURE that a buyer with an offer is well qualified........it only makes sense in servicing our Sellers properly. However, where do you draw the line. And when is it obvious to the Real Estate Commission that this IS NOT the only reason some companies PUSH their own mortgage reps.
It appears that everytime a rule or law is put in place, everyone finds a way "around" it. I don't want to hear complaints about this from people who do this, I'm aware of why it is done (various reasons). I myself, when asked, give 4 names of banks/mortgage companies that I think do a GOOD job for the comsumer. I just get angry when it is thrust upon us in a forcefull way and we end up losing sales because of it.
Someone please explain how this has become SO OUT OF HAND!! What ever happened to the obvious "STEERING" rules?
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