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Selling home - flat rate/discount brokers. Who's done it?

bgaidan

bgaidan

Red Skull Member
Joined
Jul 18, 2020
Member Number
2322
Messages
3,117
Loc
NC Triad
I kinda need to sell my old house to get out form under the HELOC I took out to buy the new one. :rolleyes:

The realtor I used for my recent purchase and the house I'm getting ready to sell (bought 6 years ago) has managed to piss me off. It's partly (mostly) my fault, but I threw out some numbers of what I thought my house would sell for and he just kind of nodded and and sure. I used the low end of my estimate as a basis for my purchase. He comes back after I bought (and he got his commission) and tells me he thins I should list it for about $30K+ less than I was thinking. I think he's dead wrong and I'll still get way more than that, but I also think he's just shooting for a low number to make a quick sale not have to spend any time on it.

Instead of scrambling to find a new realtor and then try to haggle them down to 4-4.5%, I'm debating on using one of the flat fee services that charges like $1k for listing and then you have to pay the buyer's agent....probably in the 2.25-2.5% range. Should save me at least $8k.

Anyone used one of these before?

clickit realty and Flat Fee Realty are the two that seem most prominent here. I think they both just refer you to local agents.
https://clickitrealty.com/packages/region/NC/
https://flatfeegroup.com/NorthCarolina/CompareUs.php

They'll both push the listing to MLS and all the normal websites as well as the local real estate service. The $1k package also has them doing the paperwork and contracts. The cheaper packages make you do the paperwork.


The market here is hot and stuff is selling in days. I don't see any reason to pay an agent 5-6% for what will amount to probably 10 hours of work.


Any reason not to go this route?


(In before Lance comes in to tell us how much more a realtor can get you for your house. :flipoff2:)
 
I just listed 10 acres for sale, I’m with you. Every thing is selling so why waste the money on a realtor? I did a free listing on for sale by owner.
 
Ask them if they will try listing it at your price or just over (to cover comission) for a 30 day contract.

my agent said that a lot of agents are suggesting a low end price to clients so that they are extremely happy when the agent gets them multiple higher offers.
 
2big bronco said:
Ask them if they will try listing it at your price or just over (to cover comission) for a 30 day contract.

my agent said that a lot of agents are suggesting a low end price to clients so that they are extremely happy when the agent gets them multiple higher offers.
Click to expand...

I don't want to use the guy at all.

I'm a little hesitant on starting low. The marked is fast here, but I don't think it's at the point of having bidding wars.


I tend to follow the notion of "you can always drop your price but you can't really raise it"
 
bgaidan said:
I don't want to use the guy at all.

I'm a little hesitant on starting low. The marked is fast here, but I don't think it's at the point of having bidding wars.


I tend to follow the notion of "you can always drop your price but you can't really raise it"
Click to expand...

I agree on not starting low. Do you have the time to sell it yourself? Throw it up on craigslist with a "will bay 3% to buyers agent and then figure out mls
 
2big bronco said:
I agree on not starting low. Do you have the time to sell it yourself? Throw it up on craigslist with a "will bay 3% to buyers agent and then figure out mls
Click to expand...

The services I'm looking at charge $1k flat and then whatever you say you'll pay the seller's agent. So I can get it under 3% that way. And they'll give you a lock box and scheduling service....makes it a little safer and you don't have to directly deal with letting people in your house. They'll also refer buyers without agents directly to you.
 
Go on BookFace, or MyBook, or whatever local to you platform you like and ask all your 'friends' for they're real estate agent recommendation. You'll get a dozen or so names dropped. Call them up and ask them to come by the place and give you an idea what'd it take to sell the place, and for how much they think it'll bring. You'll get a HUGE spread on the opinions.

When I sold my last place, there was a 50k swing from the high, to the low 'estimates'. We went with the 'high' agent, and the place sold on the first weekend it was listed. For full price.

The only caveat I'll throw out there, was I had prepped the house prior to having the agents come look at it. New paint. Cleaned carpets. Restained the deck. Swept the driveway. Any and everything I could think of was done prior. (We already had moved). So the house was 'ready'.
 
check with Zillow they were buying homes awhile back and offering decent money.
 
I believe Zillow allows you to post your own real estate, and there's always forsalebyowner.com
 
Realized I never updated this thread. Listed the house. Had 3 offers on day 3. Sold for just over asking, which was more than $40k more than my old realtor suggested listing it for.

I went with https://clickitrealty.com. Their fee was around $1k for the "full service" package. If I did it again, I would have stuck with the $400 or $600 plan. Their "contract/offer support" and "negotiation assistance" was pretty much non-existent...though for less experienced people there may be a benefit.

The main negative thing I have to say about them was their communication was shit. I loaded the listing info to their website and expected some type of communication on when it would actually go live. Nope, it just hit MLS on monday morning. And, of course, the sign and key box they sent got delayed in the mail and wasn't here before the listing was live. I had viewings scheduled within a couple hours of it hitting and had to scramble and run to lowes to buy a key box. And I never even put the sign up....actually just opened the box and threw it away a couple days ago. :laughing: I had also used a "placeholder" price when I set up the initial contact form and actually planned to drop it about $5k, which is what I put when I filled out the final listing form. Well, they ended up listing it with the higher price....which turned out to be a good thing!

They use a scheduling service and there's an app that goes with it. Realtors schedule the showing and you get a text or push notification to approve it. You also get any feedback from the showings through the app or website. That part was pretty easy.

The biggest thing that might not be for everyone is dealing with the agents. I had to answer all of the questions that came in...and there were surprisingly quite a few. I also ended up with 3 offers and mulling over those and making a decision was overly stressful. I had no problem with any of it, but I know there are a lot of owners that wouldn't be able to handle it.

So in the end I paid $1k for the flat fee listing and 2.25% to the buyer's agent. So on top of the $40k or so more that I got for the house, I also saved another $11k or so compared to the traditional 6% fees realtors still try to charge.

Overall, I was happy with the process. Not sure I'd go the same route if the market wasn't as hot though.
 
All you need is an FSBO site that will get you an MLS number. I did it 10 years ago. The buyers didn't have a realtor either, so it was a double win.
 
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