We all know that a home or property of any kind, in order to sell faster and at a higher price, should have what is known as curb appeal. Frequently, it is not the expensive things that make a difference. Here are some things that can be done.
Keep the grass cut, not too short, but well groomed and frequently - you never know what day a prospective buyer will drive by. Include edging along all sidewalks, driveway, and other trim items. Use the weed eater around all areas where the weeds grow up. Use hedge clippers on every possible hedge and bush. In particular, trim down any and all hedges that block views from any windows or cut down on light coming in the windows. Use lots and lots of thick, fresh, mulch. Mulch is inexpensive but does wonders in dressing up a home. If your yard or acreage has been let go too long, start with a professional service the first time and then keep up the property yourself if you want. If you have to hire a lawn and gardening service to keep the property in pristine shape, during the for-sale period, please do so. Well maintained grounds are key to best selling and a few hundred dollars during the sale period will bring you thousands more in price.
Make the property and the home inviting and showcase it by using bright colored flowers; red and yellow flowers of the brightest colors are the best. Keep the flowers well maintained and the beds well kept. Buyers won't likely see other homes in your price range with similar floral treatments and your home will rise to the top of the buyer's list.
Repair, paint, and renew, all outdoor furniture, porch furniture and decorations and all decorative items on the property. This includes the mailbox, if there is one. In fact, a bed of mulch, flowers, shrubs, to decorate the base of the mailbox can be a great first impression if it's well done and well kept.
Open the windows daily or turn on all the vent fans in kitchen and baths to freshen the air in the home. Many people are allergic to perfumes, spices and aerosol sprays so don't do the old tricks of potpourri, aerosol air fresheners, etc. Vanilla extract is usually safe. You can use some REAL vanilla extract, a few drops, on a piece of bread and put it in the oven on lowest (about 100 degrees) heat for 20 minutes or so before the house is shown. You can buy or rent electronic room deodorizers to freshen the air with filtration. If you have pets, a thorough cleaning and daily vacuuming and constant running of air cleaning units is a great idea. There are lots of people who are allergic to pet dander and the slightest smell of cats or dogs will kill the sale.
Rent a storage unit if needed, have at least one and better yet two or three yard sales and get rid of more and more of the stuff that you no longer need or use. Clean out the attic and TOTALLY organize it. Clean out the garage and out buildings and totally organize anything left inside. The more stuff you have OUT of the garage, attic, storage buildings and out of the yard (if it's not a landscaping asset) and the more you get out of the closets the more spacious the home seems to buyers.
Even a cleaned out, emptied out and fully organized garage, looks far larger and better if the cars are out of it. Before the showing, move ALL of the cars to another location, down the street (not in front of the house) or to a neighbors house or driveway. There should be NO cars in the garage, in the driveway or in front of the house when the buyer arrives with the agent.
Go through the entire home and get rid of most of the nick-knacks and about three quarters of everything else. Go to a model home or a furniture show room and study, perhaps even take pictures, of how they are decorated. Clean the home, clean the shelves and tops of things - until your property shows like a model home. This goes for every room in the house! Clean off the counters in the kitchen, clean up or put in storage MOST of the stuff in the kids rooms (everything that they don't use a lot) and get rid of any old paperback books or unsightly books on the book shelves. If the book shelves are packed, open up the shelves by putting over half of the books in storage, or sell them at the yard sale. Remove a lot of the furniture and sell what you don't want to keep at the next home, or put lots of it in storage. Dust and polish everything!
Remove all of the family pictures from the walls and furniture tops. Remove all of the non-professional pictures and art from the walls. Mend the holes. Family pictures, a very few, in the master bedroom and in the kids rooms, however, make the home seem like a happy home.
If you have a fireplace. Clean it up. Clean it out with concrete and brick cleaners and clean all the bricks and the inside of the fireplace with the appropriate professional cleaners from the fireplace store or building supply stores. In the winter, especially if it's cold or dreary and overcast outside, light the fire before the showing. In this case, stay with the fire until the Realtor gets there and then just go a short space away, to a neighbors house for instance, and return (for safety sake) as soon as the Realtor leaves. Just be certain that if you get ANY smoke in the home when lighting the fire, air out the home fully before the showing. It's great to build and establish the fire a half hour before the showing.
Make certain to wash all the windows inside and outside the home, this includes second story windows, storm windows and pressure washing or brushing and soaping all the screens too. If there is a screened porch, make certain all the screens are in perfect repair, well stretched and well cleaned. Keep every piece of glass and mirror inside the home sparkling clean.
Flower boxes are a great and profitable touch. The perennial favorite is bright red geraniums in outside window boxes, under all the windows that can be viewed from the street. There is very little that can elevate the curb appeal of a home like geraniums in window boxes, and they are inexpensive to do!
Clean, organize and clean out all the cupboards, drawers and cabinets in the kitchens and baths. Buyers frequently pull out drawers in the kitchen and bath and open cupboards to better see the size and quality of construction as well as the quality of drawer runners, whether there are pull out shelves, etc. Wow them with the quality of your inside cupboards and drawers in the kitchen and baths.
Note: You should leave the home during the time the agent is showing the house. Leave just before they get there or immediately upon their arrival. Sellers in the home are deal killers. The prospective buyers are uncomfortable speaking about the property to the agent and uncomfortable even looking too carefully at the home, if the seller is present.
Fencing is another area where you get far more back than you spend, with increased sales price and reduced time on the market! The new white vinyl fencing is a great investment to increase the value of your home, above the cost of the fencing, and set your home apart from all the others on the market.
Even condos and townhouses need to have curb appeal. If there is no yard; make certain that every bit of the steps, sidewalk, and entrance is clean, neat and in good repair. Check with the condo association to see if they will immediately and professionally repair anything that needs to be done. It is to the advantage of every owner in the complex to have your home sell for as much as possible and as fast as possible; that increases the value and salability of every unit in the association. Make certain your entrance door and surrounding areas are LOOKING GOOD!
Check all around your unit; check the parking lot and surrounding grounds; check the community landscaping too. If something needs to be done, find out if the association will attend to it, or if you can do the work yourself in some cases. For instance, if edging and weed pulling need to be done, you may be allowed to do the work near your unit. If you have concrete sidewalk and steps, for instance, just brushing on and scrubbing them with bleach will do a lot to improve the looks and first impression.
Bleach does wonders. If there is ANY mold and mildew on the outside of the home, a pressure washing with bleach will clean it and kill the mold and mildew. In case of wood siding and shingles, pressure washing with bleach (consider the double or triple strength Sodium Hypochlorite, same as bleach but stronger) will clean up wood shingles and make them look renewed. You can also use oxalic acid wood bleach or one of the professional wood and shingle cleaners. Pay attention to the labels these are effective chemicals and strong!
Proper and efficient landscaping and image enhancing techniques like these will usually add at least 15% and as much as 25% to the perceived value and thus the sales price and appraisal value of a home. Most of these techniques will bring you at least $4 back for every $1 spent.
Curb appeal should be suitably powerful that it causes people driving by the home at ten to thirty miles per hour to stop or at least turn their heads to look at your property as they go by. With a sale sign from the Realtor on your property, and great curb appeal, you should get lots and lots of people stopping, writing down the sign information and picking up brochures from the brochure box attached to the sign. Curb appeal sells!
Maximize your curb appeal and improve your first impressions when you want to sell your property. Otherwise, you will be selling slower and for less money than you will with the use of these tips.
Copyright 2000-2005 by www.JodyHudson.com
Jody Hudson has been a Realtor for 35 years.
Source of this article is: http://www.kate-jody.com/essays/MaximizingCurbAppealandFirstImpressions.html
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Thursday, April 22, 2010
What We Do To Sell Your Property!
Once you have contracted us to sell your property we go to work for you to bring you the most money and best price for your property as quickly as possible. Some properties are faster selling than others based on the location, condition, size, price, of course, and type of the property.
Price is always a consideration but proper marketing and selling techniques will usually garner you, at least, an extra 15% to 20% and that is where we shine! We go into action quickly with all of the modern and traditional methods of marketing, promoting and advertising your property. Our purpose in doing what we do is to find YOU a number of willing and able purchasers in order to encourage at least one to purchase your property -- quickly and at the highest price.
We send out "JUST LISTED" postcards to 200 homes and businesses in the surrounding area about of your property. This card directs them to the web site we set up for your home with numerous pictures, a full explanation, and all the data they want to know about your home; including the price. Those folks who live close to a property are happy to pass the word on to friends about anything new on the market. They are also the most knowledgeable and the most interested in your home selling for the top price, possible. After all, they know that the more YOUR home sells for, the higher theirs will appraise and sell for.
We publish a professional brochure or flyer for your property; distribute them in numerous ways and keep them updated and fresh in numerous local businesses and in the local restaurants. We already have flyer holders in many locations. We will mail out and deliver these flyers to other Realtors by mail and in person. If there is another Realtor who is likely to have an occasional buyer for a property such as yours, they get our special attention; we invite them for a private showing, print up special flyers just for them to mail out to their prospects, in their name, or whatever it takes, and if appropriate we assign a courtesy key to them as well.
In fact, we even go so far as to let other Realtors send THEIR customers to us, we'll show the property, and still let them have the full commission. This is not done by anyone else in the business as far as we know. The advantage is YOURS!
Your property will be added IMMEDIATELY to the Multi-list computer search service for other Realtors to see and get all possible data from our listing. Our listings are known as the most informative in the area and that helps all the other agents sell your property too. That way if any of the Realtors have a customer for a property similar to yours they will find it.
The Internet and World Wide Web are the greatest single source of Real Estate business for those who use them effectively. Web sites are virtual-color-brochures which prospective buyers can view at their leisure; then call or write us when they are ready to see your property in person. Over 97% of our prospects come from our multiple award winning Web sites. Most Realtors get only a few % of their business from the Web, but they don't have sites like this one.
We advertise our web sites in thousands of other locations on the Net. We have spent many thousands of hours and thousands of dollars to get our site to come up in the major search engines especially www.Google.com the TOP search engine on earth. Google does over 95% of the search work done on the Web, but we also pay to use another 37 of the most popular search engines as well. People LOVE pictures, especially when searching the Web. We have more pictures than any other Realtor I can find.
Most other sites have one, or perhaps two or three pictures of homes and land (at the most) on the MLS and on their web sites. We have twelve or more for most of our properties. One of our properties, a 5.5 million dollar one, had over a hundred professionally taken pictures on several web pages. Internet and MLS submissions are done as soon as the property is listed for sale with us and while you are getting the work done in the real world. This puts your property in it's best appearance while you are doing the finishing touches.
One of our sellers was not quite certain that painting the entire inside of the home and putting in all new carpeting was really important to sell their home. We did the work first on a picture-fixing program on one of our computers and they agreed with us and got the work done right away. They saw how less than $20,000 in painting and carpeting raised the value of their home at least $50,000. The did a magnificent job and it was done in a couple of weeks AFTER we had all the work done on our site here.
Another seller had an motel-apartment complex that had a fire and was burned very badly, it was almost a complete loss. With picture fixing software and a lot of time, we repaired the burned off roof, rebuilt the walls, put in new windows and doors, new sidewalks, new grass and parking and made all the improvements, on our web site, before he could repair the damage. The pictures were done several months before the work was done. Before the motel was even complete in the real world, the seller decided he liked the looks of the property on our web site so much he decided to keep the property and raise the rents to get and keep a better class of tenant. Oh well, we lost the sale but our community was improved greatly.
We place digital classified ads in all manner of periodicals, to direct people to your property on our Web sites; these ads are placed in dozens of Real Estate On Line publications. Many people search the Internet for property in special locations and are interested in recreation, lodging and real estate in our area. We have numerous ways for them to find us in Web Searches in addition to the above: we have paid to have our sites listed under tens of thousands of different search criteria with the major search engines. This is done to help buyers find us and to help sellers get more exposure. Most web sites are only listed in the search engines under one, two or ten key words and search strings, instead of the nearly 900,000 terms and search criteria that we use!
Web based marketing is responsible for well over nine tenths of the calls we get each day and is the MOST EFFECTIVE WAY TO PROMOTE A PROPERTY. For properties over $300,000 about 98% of the e-mail and calls are from our various Internet marketing activities. We also send out periodic newsletters and entice those thinking of purchasing Real Estate in the future.
As other Realtors in the area develop more professional and workable Web marketing sites; we allow them to place your property on their sites also for even more exposure. Professional real estate advisors tell us to expect over 80% of ALL real estate business to come from Internet marketing within the next two years. Our experience is already well beyond that figure!
Print media advertising is certainly not dead, but far less effective than it was a few years ago. We use it a lot. We advertise extensively in the local publications. The print media have been, until the Web, the primary source of prospects for local real estate. And they are still an effective way to get people to our Web sites. Most people who are interested in real estate pick up the local papers for the area where they want to be, as they go TO the area first, usually several times, or are advised by friends who live there. Once people are convinced to live or buy in a particular area they often subscribe to the local papers of that area.
We keep you advised and informed on local market activity and changes. We also follow up with any other Realtors who show the property to ensure that they have our complete and speedy help in getting their purchasers to buy your property instead of some other one.
There will be a For Sale Sign on your property, a nice large one, with information and pictures on a professionally done flyer which will have copies kept in a clear plastic and waterproof box attached to the sign. Our web site is listed on the sign as well. As you can see, we consider our web site to be a huge color catalog that is far too large to print otherwise - and our web sites are available all the time not just one day.
We will personally call, deliver and mail flyers to the most successful Realtors in the area who have a track record of selling properties like yours. They will ordinarily find the property on-line anyway -- but these busy Realtors still get our special and repeated attention. Other Realtors are fully in every way possible, this is not usually done in this area. We owe and give our allegiance to YOU when you list your property with us, and we are always helping others to sell your property too.
All in all, we ARE The Cutting Edge Realtors, and we're far ahead of any other Realtors in our experience, ability and activity to promote, market and sell your property.
Your best choice is to have us represent you. Are you ready! If so E-mail us.
Jody Hudson has been a Realtor for 35 years in America and in Delaware.
The source page for this article is: http://www.kate-jody.com/essays/whatwedo.html
Price is always a consideration but proper marketing and selling techniques will usually garner you, at least, an extra 15% to 20% and that is where we shine! We go into action quickly with all of the modern and traditional methods of marketing, promoting and advertising your property. Our purpose in doing what we do is to find YOU a number of willing and able purchasers in order to encourage at least one to purchase your property -- quickly and at the highest price.
We send out "JUST LISTED" postcards to 200 homes and businesses in the surrounding area about of your property. This card directs them to the web site we set up for your home with numerous pictures, a full explanation, and all the data they want to know about your home; including the price. Those folks who live close to a property are happy to pass the word on to friends about anything new on the market. They are also the most knowledgeable and the most interested in your home selling for the top price, possible. After all, they know that the more YOUR home sells for, the higher theirs will appraise and sell for.
We publish a professional brochure or flyer for your property; distribute them in numerous ways and keep them updated and fresh in numerous local businesses and in the local restaurants. We already have flyer holders in many locations. We will mail out and deliver these flyers to other Realtors by mail and in person. If there is another Realtor who is likely to have an occasional buyer for a property such as yours, they get our special attention; we invite them for a private showing, print up special flyers just for them to mail out to their prospects, in their name, or whatever it takes, and if appropriate we assign a courtesy key to them as well.
In fact, we even go so far as to let other Realtors send THEIR customers to us, we'll show the property, and still let them have the full commission. This is not done by anyone else in the business as far as we know. The advantage is YOURS!
Your property will be added IMMEDIATELY to the Multi-list computer search service for other Realtors to see and get all possible data from our listing. Our listings are known as the most informative in the area and that helps all the other agents sell your property too. That way if any of the Realtors have a customer for a property similar to yours they will find it.
The Internet and World Wide Web are the greatest single source of Real Estate business for those who use them effectively. Web sites are virtual-color-brochures which prospective buyers can view at their leisure; then call or write us when they are ready to see your property in person. Over 97% of our prospects come from our multiple award winning Web sites. Most Realtors get only a few % of their business from the Web, but they don't have sites like this one.
We advertise our web sites in thousands of other locations on the Net. We have spent many thousands of hours and thousands of dollars to get our site to come up in the major search engines especially www.Google.com the TOP search engine on earth. Google does over 95% of the search work done on the Web, but we also pay to use another 37 of the most popular search engines as well. People LOVE pictures, especially when searching the Web. We have more pictures than any other Realtor I can find.
Most other sites have one, or perhaps two or three pictures of homes and land (at the most) on the MLS and on their web sites. We have twelve or more for most of our properties. One of our properties, a 5.5 million dollar one, had over a hundred professionally taken pictures on several web pages. Internet and MLS submissions are done as soon as the property is listed for sale with us and while you are getting the work done in the real world. This puts your property in it's best appearance while you are doing the finishing touches.
One of our sellers was not quite certain that painting the entire inside of the home and putting in all new carpeting was really important to sell their home. We did the work first on a picture-fixing program on one of our computers and they agreed with us and got the work done right away. They saw how less than $20,000 in painting and carpeting raised the value of their home at least $50,000. The did a magnificent job and it was done in a couple of weeks AFTER we had all the work done on our site here.
Another seller had an motel-apartment complex that had a fire and was burned very badly, it was almost a complete loss. With picture fixing software and a lot of time, we repaired the burned off roof, rebuilt the walls, put in new windows and doors, new sidewalks, new grass and parking and made all the improvements, on our web site, before he could repair the damage. The pictures were done several months before the work was done. Before the motel was even complete in the real world, the seller decided he liked the looks of the property on our web site so much he decided to keep the property and raise the rents to get and keep a better class of tenant. Oh well, we lost the sale but our community was improved greatly.
We place digital classified ads in all manner of periodicals, to direct people to your property on our Web sites; these ads are placed in dozens of Real Estate On Line publications. Many people search the Internet for property in special locations and are interested in recreation, lodging and real estate in our area. We have numerous ways for them to find us in Web Searches in addition to the above: we have paid to have our sites listed under tens of thousands of different search criteria with the major search engines. This is done to help buyers find us and to help sellers get more exposure. Most web sites are only listed in the search engines under one, two or ten key words and search strings, instead of the nearly 900,000 terms and search criteria that we use!
Web based marketing is responsible for well over nine tenths of the calls we get each day and is the MOST EFFECTIVE WAY TO PROMOTE A PROPERTY. For properties over $300,000 about 98% of the e-mail and calls are from our various Internet marketing activities. We also send out periodic newsletters and entice those thinking of purchasing Real Estate in the future.
As other Realtors in the area develop more professional and workable Web marketing sites; we allow them to place your property on their sites also for even more exposure. Professional real estate advisors tell us to expect over 80% of ALL real estate business to come from Internet marketing within the next two years. Our experience is already well beyond that figure!
Print media advertising is certainly not dead, but far less effective than it was a few years ago. We use it a lot. We advertise extensively in the local publications. The print media have been, until the Web, the primary source of prospects for local real estate. And they are still an effective way to get people to our Web sites. Most people who are interested in real estate pick up the local papers for the area where they want to be, as they go TO the area first, usually several times, or are advised by friends who live there. Once people are convinced to live or buy in a particular area they often subscribe to the local papers of that area.
We keep you advised and informed on local market activity and changes. We also follow up with any other Realtors who show the property to ensure that they have our complete and speedy help in getting their purchasers to buy your property instead of some other one.
There will be a For Sale Sign on your property, a nice large one, with information and pictures on a professionally done flyer which will have copies kept in a clear plastic and waterproof box attached to the sign. Our web site is listed on the sign as well. As you can see, we consider our web site to be a huge color catalog that is far too large to print otherwise - and our web sites are available all the time not just one day.
We will personally call, deliver and mail flyers to the most successful Realtors in the area who have a track record of selling properties like yours. They will ordinarily find the property on-line anyway -- but these busy Realtors still get our special and repeated attention. Other Realtors are fully in every way possible, this is not usually done in this area. We owe and give our allegiance to YOU when you list your property with us, and we are always helping others to sell your property too.
All in all, we ARE The Cutting Edge Realtors, and we're far ahead of any other Realtors in our experience, ability and activity to promote, market and sell your property.
Your best choice is to have us represent you. Are you ready! If so E-mail us.
Jody Hudson has been a Realtor for 35 years in America and in Delaware.
The source page for this article is: http://www.kate-jody.com/essays/whatwedo.html
Monday, April 19, 2010
Where Does Your Real Estate Commission Fee Go - Why is The Commission so HIGH?
Many who have bought and sold properties through Realtors numerous times; even many real estate agents themselves, don't know where the commission money goes. After all, when a property sells for hundreds of thousands of dollars and the commission is tens of thousands of dollars, it seems like there is a terrific amount of money charged as commission -- and there is.
Even many attorneys, who have spent a decade or more in expensive colleges, fought to get through the Bar exam, and then spent years in their profession -- seem concerned that the commission fee is far larger than the attorney fee when all the fees are paid at settlement.
Let's start with the part that few real estate agents understand. It costs the real estate company they work for, between $19,000 and $45,000 per year for each agent to have a license, desk, and the use of company building, parking, real estate, taxes, insurance, utilities and professional support services -- whether they sell anything or not. Since the real estate brokerage commission is split between the company and the agent, an agent must make three to six thousand dollars every month in commissions for the company to break even on that agent with the company share of the fee. And, most importantly, the less productive agents in the office raise the cost for everyone. The other agents therefore, must each earn more to carry the share of the less productive. Many agencies will ONLY allow high quality, top producing agents to work at the company, so that the less successful agents don't pull down the average income of the company investment.
The total commission is split between the listing company and the listing agent ; and the selling company and the selling agent. Usually the commission is split four ways, sometimes it is more. Splits are arranged within each company and for each agent; sometimes there are numerous different percentages and split arrangements in each office.
The company part of the commission is spent on office rent or mortgage, taxes, property insurance, maintenance, signs, radio and TV advertising, bill boards, magazine and newspaper ads, cleaning, supplies, phones, paper, desks, utilities, legal fees and legal insurances, management and support staff as well as numerous memberships, dues, legal fees and expert professionals. Many companies also pay a fee to a franchise company or home office for the right to use the company name. Fees are also paid to regional and national home offices to defray national and regional advertising, management, staff, etc.
In the final analysis, an office that has 10 licensed agents must require those agents to bring in at least forty to seventy thousand dollars in commissions every month to keep the office bills paid!!! I don't know any real estate agents who actually understand or believe this, unless they have personally been responsible for office expenses for a year or more. Responsible, meaning writing the checks out of an account that costs THEM money. Even then it's hard to understand how it all adds up to such a huge figure, but it does. Offices that earn less than these amounts per agent are disappearing fast, few remain as it is.
Computer purchase, maintainance, training and software expenses are now one of the larger expenses. Many offices feel squashed financially, by the financial pressure of adding the purchase of computers, printers, digital cameras, and the maintenance, networking, repair, software and constant management of computers to the already high cost of doing business. In fact, there are even a few of the larger companies who specialize in purchasing other real estate companies who can't keep up with the expense and responsibility of this digital age. Any company or agent who is not keeping pace with digital realty and digital real estate, is not likely to be around much longer.
More and more people rely on the Internet to pre-shop for real estate. You know that. You are one of them and we welcome you to our site.
The purpose of our Web Site is to allow you to educate yourself and pre-shop for real estate before you call us. Let us know if you want us to have anything else on our site for you. We'll listen! As the Internet becomes the favored tool it is also the most important tool for buyers -- radio, print and sign ads become less workable. Smart sellers now want to see what a Realtor is doing on the web before they choose which Realtor to list their property for sale with.
Advertising and marketing expenses have grown tremendously over the years. For instance, when I first got into the business, thirty years ago, I started out helping to manage a real estate, building and developing company. At that time, over 60% of our phone calls came from signs on the property. Also at that time, bulk mail cost an average of thirty cents a piece to create, print, post and send and our response rate was often 3% or more!!! Now less than 10% of our calls come from signs on the property. Bulk mail averages over a dollar a piece and mail response is far less than half of one percent. In fact according to one national Realtor's marketing research team, real estate mailings now range in response from one in a thousand to one in three hundred. The best results costing the most to obtain because of expensive mailing pieces with full color, pictures, etc. One recent survey showed that average cost per resonse to a mailing was $2,000 - whether it was a lot of cheap postcards or fewer nicely printed color pieces.
Since 1971, I have studied and researched marketing and sales via schooling, reading and keeping good records of expenses and results. Thirty years ago the average cost of newspaper advertising to get a phone call was seven dollars. One in every ten calls coming to a top agent, resulted in an appointment. One in five appointments resulted (for a top agent) in a sale! Of course these were averages based on the best advertising, telephone and selling techniques that were available. Often the averages were not as good in other companies or for other agents. So the average cost of a sale using just print ads was about $350 thirty years ago. For my office of 50 agents in 1979, the average print, signage and bulk mail advertising cost had risen to $500 per call.
Now the average cost of one phone call from a print ad is from two thousand to five thousand dollars and that is growing by the month! So even if one could get one in ten calls to result in an appointment, and one in five appointments to result in a sale, the cost of advertising per contract would be phenomenal.
The nicer the property, the more attractively priced it is or the better it is located the more response the ad will get. Luckily for print ad salespeople and newspapers, few Realtors keep records of what advertising costs and results are. Singage is still a factor in obtaining calls and used to be the most cost effective. Therefore many Realtors will seek to get a listing in a hot area, no matter what the listed price, just to get a sign on the property! Can you blame them?
Print ads are done mostly to please the seller. After all the seller wants to see something tangible as proof that the Realtor is spending some money before that big commission is paid out at settlement. We certainly can't fault them for that either, can we? Interestingly enough, those sellers who price their property highest for what it is and who are located farthest from where the most buyers want such a property, are quite often the ones who most want to see their property advertised expensively!!! In the case of an overpriced property that is not well located -- thousands of dollars can be spent in advertising with not one phone call resulting! It's just part of our business and always has been. Ironically those sellers who have property priced the highest for it's location and want the most advertising, are often the ones who want to pay the least commission too.
You may find this all unbelievable! It is! I've been doing this business all my adult life, going to courses every year, working in the business in many parts of the country as a property specialist -- and I still can't believe the costs and conditions of this business. I am amazed every day by all this!
Each company pays their agents differently but the overall or gross commission as it is called is split in some fashion between the company and the agents. The expenses are split too. The most productive agents usually get a larger split of the commission, relative to the company. Some companies offer top agents the right to rent office space, usually at least twenty thousand dollars a year, and keep all the commission! And, top agents almost always spend a far larger percentage of what they earn for advertising, marketing, education and other business expenses that are designed to bring them future sales and income.
The best agents, the best ones for the seller to have, are those who do everything possible to let all the rest of the Realtors in the area know everything possible about the property they have for sale so that other Realtors can try to sell it too. When two Realtors from different offices are involved in the sale the commissions are split in half again. Typically each of the two companies involved would split the commission and then each of them would split with the agents involved. Often there are other commission splits payable as well to a referring agents; an agent who referred the listing or one who referred the buyer. To give you an idea of what all this means, when I averaged all the commissions I made over the last several years I averaged three quarters of one percent of the sales price for the properties I sold - BEFORE expenses! Now you can see why we all try to sell millions of dollars of property each year!
In most areas there is another expensive service that the companies and the agents use -- the Multiple Listing Service or MLS. This is where all the agents have agreed to put everything they have on a centralized and searchable computer so that all agents can have access to all properties. Once you choose your Realtor that person can access everything in the central computer files if they are a member of the MLS. Some of the smaller companies are not members because of the cost.
From the proceeds of commissions earned by the sales and listing agents, they then pay for their auto expenses, MLS fees, annual county, state and national Realtor dues, commercial licensing fees, business licenses, electronic lockbox keys, advertising, insurance, legal fees, computer related expenses, phone bills, etc. In the final analysis a Realtor who sells two million dollars in real estate a year is usually working diligently and effectively for his clients for only average earnings in area where she lives after all these expenses. And there are others; client gifts, professional dinners and luncheons, Chamber of Commerce dues, and numerous charities who consider that Realtors are the most likely to donate heavily to all the charities... since they have so much money.
Selling Real Estate is a life style and profession most of us would not trade for anything. And there are some of us who have made a nice living over the years at this wonderful job. It's all about helping others. If we do it well, we are paid well, and if we do it very well we are paid very well! Happily I have been working as a Realtor since 1972 and I LOVE it.
We know that for us we have the best job on earth and we do it our way. We use primarily the modern tools of the Net, Multiple Web sites, all the latest devices and techniques, MLS, several computers, as well as selected traditional mailings, some print ads and several professional assistants all to help our clients better and faster!
May we help YOU? We hope so! And, we hope to get paid when we do!
Copyright 2000-2005 by www.JodyHudson.com
Jody Hudson has been a Realtor in America and in Delaware for 35 years.
The source page for this article is: http://www.kate-jody.com/essays/commissionfee.html
Even many attorneys, who have spent a decade or more in expensive colleges, fought to get through the Bar exam, and then spent years in their profession -- seem concerned that the commission fee is far larger than the attorney fee when all the fees are paid at settlement.
Let's start with the part that few real estate agents understand. It costs the real estate company they work for, between $19,000 and $45,000 per year for each agent to have a license, desk, and the use of company building, parking, real estate, taxes, insurance, utilities and professional support services -- whether they sell anything or not. Since the real estate brokerage commission is split between the company and the agent, an agent must make three to six thousand dollars every month in commissions for the company to break even on that agent with the company share of the fee. And, most importantly, the less productive agents in the office raise the cost for everyone. The other agents therefore, must each earn more to carry the share of the less productive. Many agencies will ONLY allow high quality, top producing agents to work at the company, so that the less successful agents don't pull down the average income of the company investment.
The total commission is split between the listing company and the listing agent ; and the selling company and the selling agent. Usually the commission is split four ways, sometimes it is more. Splits are arranged within each company and for each agent; sometimes there are numerous different percentages and split arrangements in each office.
The company part of the commission is spent on office rent or mortgage, taxes, property insurance, maintenance, signs, radio and TV advertising, bill boards, magazine and newspaper ads, cleaning, supplies, phones, paper, desks, utilities, legal fees and legal insurances, management and support staff as well as numerous memberships, dues, legal fees and expert professionals. Many companies also pay a fee to a franchise company or home office for the right to use the company name. Fees are also paid to regional and national home offices to defray national and regional advertising, management, staff, etc.
In the final analysis, an office that has 10 licensed agents must require those agents to bring in at least forty to seventy thousand dollars in commissions every month to keep the office bills paid!!! I don't know any real estate agents who actually understand or believe this, unless they have personally been responsible for office expenses for a year or more. Responsible, meaning writing the checks out of an account that costs THEM money. Even then it's hard to understand how it all adds up to such a huge figure, but it does. Offices that earn less than these amounts per agent are disappearing fast, few remain as it is.
Computer purchase, maintainance, training and software expenses are now one of the larger expenses. Many offices feel squashed financially, by the financial pressure of adding the purchase of computers, printers, digital cameras, and the maintenance, networking, repair, software and constant management of computers to the already high cost of doing business. In fact, there are even a few of the larger companies who specialize in purchasing other real estate companies who can't keep up with the expense and responsibility of this digital age. Any company or agent who is not keeping pace with digital realty and digital real estate, is not likely to be around much longer.
More and more people rely on the Internet to pre-shop for real estate. You know that. You are one of them and we welcome you to our site.
The purpose of our Web Site is to allow you to educate yourself and pre-shop for real estate before you call us. Let us know if you want us to have anything else on our site for you. We'll listen! As the Internet becomes the favored tool it is also the most important tool for buyers -- radio, print and sign ads become less workable. Smart sellers now want to see what a Realtor is doing on the web before they choose which Realtor to list their property for sale with.
Advertising and marketing expenses have grown tremendously over the years. For instance, when I first got into the business, thirty years ago, I started out helping to manage a real estate, building and developing company. At that time, over 60% of our phone calls came from signs on the property. Also at that time, bulk mail cost an average of thirty cents a piece to create, print, post and send and our response rate was often 3% or more!!! Now less than 10% of our calls come from signs on the property. Bulk mail averages over a dollar a piece and mail response is far less than half of one percent. In fact according to one national Realtor's marketing research team, real estate mailings now range in response from one in a thousand to one in three hundred. The best results costing the most to obtain because of expensive mailing pieces with full color, pictures, etc. One recent survey showed that average cost per resonse to a mailing was $2,000 - whether it was a lot of cheap postcards or fewer nicely printed color pieces.
Since 1971, I have studied and researched marketing and sales via schooling, reading and keeping good records of expenses and results. Thirty years ago the average cost of newspaper advertising to get a phone call was seven dollars. One in every ten calls coming to a top agent, resulted in an appointment. One in five appointments resulted (for a top agent) in a sale! Of course these were averages based on the best advertising, telephone and selling techniques that were available. Often the averages were not as good in other companies or for other agents. So the average cost of a sale using just print ads was about $350 thirty years ago. For my office of 50 agents in 1979, the average print, signage and bulk mail advertising cost had risen to $500 per call.
Now the average cost of one phone call from a print ad is from two thousand to five thousand dollars and that is growing by the month! So even if one could get one in ten calls to result in an appointment, and one in five appointments to result in a sale, the cost of advertising per contract would be phenomenal.
The nicer the property, the more attractively priced it is or the better it is located the more response the ad will get. Luckily for print ad salespeople and newspapers, few Realtors keep records of what advertising costs and results are. Singage is still a factor in obtaining calls and used to be the most cost effective. Therefore many Realtors will seek to get a listing in a hot area, no matter what the listed price, just to get a sign on the property! Can you blame them?
Print ads are done mostly to please the seller. After all the seller wants to see something tangible as proof that the Realtor is spending some money before that big commission is paid out at settlement. We certainly can't fault them for that either, can we? Interestingly enough, those sellers who price their property highest for what it is and who are located farthest from where the most buyers want such a property, are quite often the ones who most want to see their property advertised expensively!!! In the case of an overpriced property that is not well located -- thousands of dollars can be spent in advertising with not one phone call resulting! It's just part of our business and always has been. Ironically those sellers who have property priced the highest for it's location and want the most advertising, are often the ones who want to pay the least commission too.
You may find this all unbelievable! It is! I've been doing this business all my adult life, going to courses every year, working in the business in many parts of the country as a property specialist -- and I still can't believe the costs and conditions of this business. I am amazed every day by all this!
Each company pays their agents differently but the overall or gross commission as it is called is split in some fashion between the company and the agents. The expenses are split too. The most productive agents usually get a larger split of the commission, relative to the company. Some companies offer top agents the right to rent office space, usually at least twenty thousand dollars a year, and keep all the commission! And, top agents almost always spend a far larger percentage of what they earn for advertising, marketing, education and other business expenses that are designed to bring them future sales and income.
The best agents, the best ones for the seller to have, are those who do everything possible to let all the rest of the Realtors in the area know everything possible about the property they have for sale so that other Realtors can try to sell it too. When two Realtors from different offices are involved in the sale the commissions are split in half again. Typically each of the two companies involved would split the commission and then each of them would split with the agents involved. Often there are other commission splits payable as well to a referring agents; an agent who referred the listing or one who referred the buyer. To give you an idea of what all this means, when I averaged all the commissions I made over the last several years I averaged three quarters of one percent of the sales price for the properties I sold - BEFORE expenses! Now you can see why we all try to sell millions of dollars of property each year!
In most areas there is another expensive service that the companies and the agents use -- the Multiple Listing Service or MLS. This is where all the agents have agreed to put everything they have on a centralized and searchable computer so that all agents can have access to all properties. Once you choose your Realtor that person can access everything in the central computer files if they are a member of the MLS. Some of the smaller companies are not members because of the cost.
From the proceeds of commissions earned by the sales and listing agents, they then pay for their auto expenses, MLS fees, annual county, state and national Realtor dues, commercial licensing fees, business licenses, electronic lockbox keys, advertising, insurance, legal fees, computer related expenses, phone bills, etc. In the final analysis a Realtor who sells two million dollars in real estate a year is usually working diligently and effectively for his clients for only average earnings in area where she lives after all these expenses. And there are others; client gifts, professional dinners and luncheons, Chamber of Commerce dues, and numerous charities who consider that Realtors are the most likely to donate heavily to all the charities... since they have so much money.
Selling Real Estate is a life style and profession most of us would not trade for anything. And there are some of us who have made a nice living over the years at this wonderful job. It's all about helping others. If we do it well, we are paid well, and if we do it very well we are paid very well! Happily I have been working as a Realtor since 1972 and I LOVE it.
We know that for us we have the best job on earth and we do it our way. We use primarily the modern tools of the Net, Multiple Web sites, all the latest devices and techniques, MLS, several computers, as well as selected traditional mailings, some print ads and several professional assistants all to help our clients better and faster!
May we help YOU? We hope so! And, we hope to get paid when we do!
Copyright 2000-2005 by www.JodyHudson.com
Jody Hudson has been a Realtor in America and in Delaware for 35 years.
The source page for this article is: http://www.kate-jody.com/essays/commissionfee.html
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