One Lie Real Estate Agents Tell - Sometimes Unintentionally

Eric Recktenwald - I agree with everything you said in your comment. As real estate agents we do add value to the transaction through our expertise and often reduce carrying costs. In turn this often will pay for and sometimes even exceed the commission on the sale of the home. Plus there are intangibles such as reduced stress and liability reduction.

Jill Murty - yes it is always imporant to convey information acurately and in context. That's my basic point here. 

Troy Erickson - yes, there are lots of little things agents (mis)use to lure clients. Sometimes interntionally (really bad), and sometimes unintentionally (they need more education or understanding). Either way it can lead to a poor reputation of real estate agents.

Wanda Kubat-Nerdin - It is important to know your local market and local numbers. It amazes me when I hear local agents quote national numbers because of some internet article (or even worse a print article which is several weeks old when they finally read it) and those national numbers don't correlate with local numbers because the local market has shifted or is not following that trend. All the more reason to use a LOCAL expert!

Kat Palmiotti - yes, what are the questions and data streams behind the numbers. I love it at election time when one candidate is up 2% in the polls and the poll has a 4% margin of error and the up candidate's people rejoice... um your person could be losing based on the margin of error. I do the same thing with Zestimates and their accuracy rating, kills the Zillow questions immediately.

Diana Dahlberg - Yup, it's all about them achieving their goal in the end - and that's were we come in. We are not super heros, we are more like coaches who help our players (buyers or sellers) achieve what they want in the end (to buy or sell a home). We can't tell them exactly how it will happen, at exactly what price, but we can give outside guidance and often get them to achieve and sometimes exceed their goals.

Richard Bazinet /MBA - To defend your devil's advocate points... I did not say NAR published lies, I said some agents sometimes come to invalid conclusions and state them as fact. An agent can't make the conclusion that Realtors will make you $40k+ on a $200k home based on the NAR facts that average agent assisted homes sell, on average for $40k+ than a FSBO.

Local data will always trump larger scale (national) data. My MLS says on average across the MLS coverage area prices are up about 8% this year - a fact I don't disagree with, but when I talk to an owner in a specific area of town and run the numbers on his neighborhood, or even on similar homes throughout the MLS the numbers aren't as rosy - most recently about a 1.5% increase where this specific seller lives.

A competent agent is what I want all agents to be. I want each of us to know our craft well and be better agents. The better we all are, the more the general public will trust us and reflects better on the industry.

Nina Hollander it's not the statistic that is troublesome, it's the conclusion some make from the statistic and misusing the information. I think you're correct that more FSBOs are potentially lower priced homes any way therefore the average is lower, all the more reason the conclusions some make from those numbers are erroneous.

Jeff Dowler CRS - exactly, statistics can show trends, they don't provide exact answers. Past behavior is not a guarantee of future occurrences.

John DL Arendsen Thanks for the encouraging words. Yes sometimes people don't realize what they are saying and they can really set themselves uip for failure - or at least egg on their face when their promises don't come true.

Sheila Anderson - Thanks Sheila, I can't tell you how many times I've heard this said or in print. When I saw it the last time it prompted this post.