| You could potentially do without a real estate agent to buy or sell
a house ... but you could only buy a houuse that was "For Sale by
Owner". Any house listed by an agent cannot be purchased privately
until after the listing expires ... and moreover if the seller sells
to you after the listing expires and the agent can prove that you were
introduced to the house because of the listing, then the seller will
be hit for the fees anyway. If you make an offer on an agent listed
house, then your negotiating is done through the seller's agent, and
he/she becomes in effect your buyer's agent too. The seller is 100%
obligated to refer you to his agent unless you have an agent acting
for you.
Also, the seller pays the real estate fees from his proceeds. Most
people selling privately will ask the same, if not more than an
agents listing price on the grounds that they will be forced to
negotiate down by the amount of the agents fees anyway! After all,
they are selling privately, not to give the buyer a better deal,
but to not pay the commission themselves ... i.e. they want a bigger
piece of the pie.
Dealing without a lawyer can be even more difficult because the
vendor will probably use a lawyer and he may refuse to deal with
other than a lawyer, and the mortgage lender will absolutely require
a lawyer, which you'll have to pay anyway, and you can be sure
he will charge significantly more if he is not acting for you as
the purchaser as well. Also getting your lender to accept you
working without a lawyer may be hard. Your lender may also require
you to purchase title insurance if you do not have a lawyer to
do your conveyancing.
Add to that, the fact that you'll need a title search done by
a title searcher who will probably charge you more because lawyers
will get volume discounts.
Bottom line is that yes, you can do without a Real Estate agent,
but you limit the number of properties available to look at and
you will probably not get the bargain you hoped for.
Yes you can do without a lawyer, but you may be subject to lots
of hassles and running around and bills from other people
involved that make it not worth the effort.
Stuart
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| Stuart,
Thanks for your reply. I questioned myself before quite a lot
as friends had told me that some did the whole buying deal by
themselves. Unfortunately, I did not get the details of their
profit/loss for the spent efforts.
My question partly came from after I had dealt with 2 real estate
agents. I observed that they also studied ads, drove around and
looked at the selling panels in front of the objects. They however
told me that just they are able to arrange appointments to visit
the objects.
Now I am more informed.
Regards,
Quoc Nguyen
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| Quoc,
I looked into selling myself and do the legal work myself for
purchase and sale. I worked out that because I was unfamiliar with
the little details of the system, although I knew all the needed
steps, it would take me about 24 -30 working hours at assorted times
and that is living in the same city ... Then I considered that if
things didn't go smoothly, if I was late for closing, I could be
sued. (Lawyers are paid the big bucks to make sure closing happens
the way it should and take all kinds of risks away). Too risky!
On my last sale and purchase with new mortgage, I paid about $1200
in legal professional fees. There were other disbursements that
I would have had to pay anyway, so I don't count those.
If I had to pay the banks lawyer for the mortgage separately, I'd
have paid around $600. So, I would paid around $750 in legal related
fees and used say 25 hours directly of my own time plus a lot of
gasoline and downtown parking fees! In cash, I'd probably have
saved maybe $350-400, but if my own time was worth say $15 per hour
that would be $375 ... so I've saved NOTHING and potentially cost
something too!
As to real-estate agents ... they do more than just drive around.
They use the MLS (Multiple Listing Service) computer to determine
what homes are available. They drive by lots of homes to get a
better idea of what the home is really like. Often the picture
stored in the computer or in their listings book isn't very good
to get an accurate idea of the property. They will also drive by
"For Sale by Owner" houses.
If you've been with agents who have to look at all the houses like that
then it implies that maybe they are not familiar with the neighbourhood
you are looking in ... maybe you should consider a different agent
who is.
The agent will also do the negotiating for you, removing your emotions
from the negotiating table. Negotiating a house price can be a VERY
emotional business.
As I mentioned, when you buy without an agent, you may actually be
using an agent ... the seller's agent! The only real private deal
is where you buy a house that is being sold without an agent and there
are not many of thosee.
Stuart
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