The Truth About Real Estate Agents

From Reddit [1]

Here’s the truth about real estate agents. Realtor is a trademarked term, btw. If any agent refers to themself as a realtor, run the other way. Hardly any of the popular agents are actually good agents. They rely on volume and so they will tell you whatever is necessary to get you to the closing time and you are merely a future paycheck to them.

The best agents are under the radar, don’t have their face on billboards and don’t run social media ads promoting their business. Instead, they only run social media ads promoting only your property. They negotiate deals and do whatever you want in on your terms while providing honest feedback and advice.

When buying or selling, find an agent that is newer to the profession but does not rely on real estate commissions as their sole source of income. This is imperative because they don’t need your sale to put food on the table. They should also have their shit together, providing all the data about comparable sales, etc.. and ffs they should know that closing costs are deducted from capital gains, what a 1031 exchange is, how to read a closing statement, etc.

So yes, a lot of real estate commissions has become a racket of sorts. The agent association is usually worst of them all. They charge agents hefty fees and draw fat salaries for hardly anything in return.

Engineer/real estate agent and investor here btw. Ive had my license for two years now and pursued it because I hated the profession like many of you. There are some good ones, and most of them follow the common themes I’ve listed above.