Move to exp Realty

Wow!! Today is my first day with my new real estate company: eXp Realty.  This is really exciting for me, and will be a great benefit for my clients.

As most of you know, there is a real shift occurring in real estate.  With the recent fall in home prices and the consequent shaking out in the real estate market, there have been some radical changes.  Exp Realty is a virtual real estate company, which is uniquely poised to take advantage of a lot of these changes.  Here are my favorite reasons for working with them:

1. A core understanding of technology.

Many companies know that the Internet and social media are important.  They know that smart phones and Ipads are game changers.  But they still don’t get IT!!  The owners and operators have to understand, use, and embrace these technologies.  If you try to hire a couple of geeky guys to hook up printers and help folks with email at your office, that isn’t even close to enough.  The key players in your company need to be the early adapters and facilitators in the use of technology to sell real estate.

The Internet is such a critical part of how homes are bought and sold today, I want to work with a company who has built their foundation on that concept.

They have to have tools that allow clients to do easy searches and find homes quickly and easily.  There need to be tools for me as an agent to quickly reach my clients and fill their needs.

2. Fees

By fees do I mean the 6% or whatever that companies charge to sell a home?  Yes and No.  That is an important part of the equation, but there are other HIDDEN fees in many transactions.  How about $175 or $225 added on to the 6% you pay to sell your home for the privilege of working with XYZ or ABC real estate.  What about companies that charge $175 or $225 dollars to you as a buyer to do a transaction with them.  I don’t agree with that.  If I am selling a $300,000 home or buying it.  There are $18,000 of real estate fees there.  Even with two different brokerages, that works out to $9000 per company.  That is a lot of moola!! If you can’t pay all your stuff from that, you need to work on your own finances.

Now sometimes folks won’t balk at that additional fee.  Again on an $18000 transaction, a couple of hundred extra bucks isn’t that big of a deal.  But who wants to get “nickel and dime”‘d to death?  Sometimes when clients question or resist too much, the agents will just pay it.  This is money that they are paying to work for the broker.  Not good.  If you have a big fancy office, someone has to pay for that.  Fees go to help with that.  I think I get most of my work done in my car and then at home.  I hardly even use an office, and I don’t have an Ipad(yet).

Agents will often have to pay a franchise fee.  I know of companies that charge 8.5% of the commission to pay the franchise fees.  That is ok with me if I am getting something back from the franchise.  But what? When I get a referral from the company I already give them 25% referral fee.  Can’t they make money off of that?

I think that the whole fees comes down to the fact that they are using agents as an income source.  Big salaries to the corporate Wall Street types and bureaucracies that they are so good at creating.  They have to pay utilities, rent, and travel expenses.  No thanks.

Exp Realty pays 80% commission splits.  There is a $50 a month technology fee (like most places) for the Internet tools.  I don’t mind paying for my share of tools.    With this extra money, I can buy custom yard signs for my clients, promote on custom websites, do postcards and mail-outs for open houses, make cool YouTube videos, and pay all of my other expenses to be able to promote my clients properties.

I am excited to be part of this new organization and I look forward to helping you!  If you want more information about eXp Realty call me at 633.7775

Tagged as: buyers, eXp Realty, fees, Sellers