Yea I could do that, it just happens so rarely that it isn't a big concern and 80% of my business is listings. Buyers are very risky especially in this market - unless they're insanely motivated and willing to pay over list price it's just a waste of my time to drive them around.

HOW'S IT WORKING OUT FOR YOU, BRO?

Imo Because it’s a first of all a advisory/relationship based business ..and second of all it’s an industry that is super regional/neighborhood even STREET specific … lastly a broker is there to legally protect you as well, the industry is highly regulated and ignorance is not a defense!

Most people are only charging 4-5% to be split

I sold my house last month in Tampa for close to 3x what we paid five years ago. In addition the buyer gave us $2400 towards our documentary stamp/tax fee, their buyers agent took a half-percent reduction in their commission as well to make the deal go through. AND we were given up to 60 days post-closing to continue occupying the house (free of charge) while we worked on our relocation.

Originally I listed it myself via the For Sale By Owner feature on Zillow. But overall that just got me massively spammed by hungry agents looking to represent my house and take a cut of the sale. Plus when you do this, if someone searches on Zillow your house doesn't show up UNLESS they know to click a tab for "other listings" as your house isn't listed on the MLS, so you lose a lot of eyeballs.

Eventually I took the advice of a buddy of mine who sold a secondary home via a service called Houzeo.com which will charge a flat-fee (we paid a little over $400) and you are assigned a realtor who will submit your listing to the MLS across multiple sites for that flat fee.

So we saved thousands of dollars over having our own agent (although realtors will try to come in and say "oh, you could've gotten a LOT more money if you listed with me"). But the truth is I had already done the comps myself and priced the home right and was able to get the buyer to bump up their offer by 15K over their initial offer, and it was priced comparably with other homes that had recently sold.

I didn't need a realtor to suck thousands out of my pocket to do something I was able to do myself.

The Title Company I selected as the seller did mess something up that would've cost me a few thousand dollars, but I caught it and got them to correct it.

That's great but there's a lot of people that need RE services and are willing to pay. Most FSBO's I run across are type A strong personalities that know everything and are very cheap - I try to avoid them as I know a deal with them is going to be a nightmare and the pay is lower. I'm sure you had to pay the Buyer's Broker a commission so in the end how much did you really save?

Yes I was fine paying a buyers agent because they're bringing me the buyer, I just didn't need a sellers agent dipping into my pockets as well.

The traditional 6% overall commission one used to pay, in my instance, was dropped to just 2% (I offered 2.5% for the buyers agent and they offered to lower it to 2% to get the deal done). So I saved a significant chunk of change by selling on my own.

And yes, I'm cheap, I have three cats to feed!

That's funny because most RE agents I run across know nothing and are glorified door openers.

Ha I can't argue with you on that one - the barrier to entry is so low and every housewife seems to be licensed.

Yeah, I flew out to Texas to look at a home, pictures and description looked great, lady knew I was flying in from Florida to see the home.

I get there and THAT is when I find out about the roof damage, water damage and electrical issues with the home. I am not a fan of realtors, they're like used car salesmen, just used homes salesmen instead.

Ouch. There's good and bad in every industry - I've met some great people in the RE game, and some that are braindead/repulsive.