Selling Real Estate Questions

Can you explain your fee structure when I sell my house with your company?

There are several ways brokers can be paid:

• Seller of home pays fees by way of commission splits
• House Buyer pays fees
• Retainer fees
• Hourly rate
• Percentage fee
• Flat fee

In residential sales, most buyers brokers commissions are paid by the seller in the form of commission splits for the listings broker. 

If the broker is not authorized to split the commission the buyers broker will inform the buyer that they will be responsible for paying the commission.

Sellers are primarily concerned with selling their property and netting a certain amount of money from selling their house.   Sellers are usually less concerned about whether their brokers splits commission with a buyers broker or a transaction broker.

The buyer may elect to pay the commission directly to their broker.  However most of the time this does not happen because the lender does not see this as part of the purchase price, and refuses to include it and the buyer would pay it out of pocket at closing. 

Some brokers may charge a retainer fee, usually as a screening device to determine whether a buyer is serious buyer.

Brokers may charge an hourly rate if they feel time is going to be a major factor in finding the property, usually happens with large commercial development.  Or they feel there is a risk that the sale will not take place because there is an unusual nature of the property.

Broker may charge a percentage fee. Rigler Realty does not do do percentage fee because we do not want to create a feeling of disloyalty to our buyers that we are pushing a higher purchase price to receive a greater the fee.  Percentage fee is usually done with a seller or because the broker has agreed to split his commission with the buyers broker.

A flat fee is sometimes used and is based on the brokers estimate time of work that will be involved.  A fee is often based on what a buyer expects to pay in contract to a commission which is based on a percentage of the sale price. 

In general we do not charge a fee to when you buy a home from us. Generally brokers who work with buyers are paid a split commission form the listing broker, but sometimes it can be paid by the buyer.

Generally when you sell a home with Rigler Realty, we are paid on a commission when you close on your home. We work out the details prior to you even looking at the home.  A commission is usually paid by the seller, the listing Realtor and the seller come to a decision of what commission will be paid. It is usually a percentage of the purchase price, this price usually can range any where from 1-7% however this could be more or less.

There is no set percentage that can be charged because this would be price fixing and against the law and National association of Realtors (NAR) code of ethics.

When it comes to selling my house, what should I price my house at? How you help me to come up with a good price?

We will do a detailed analysis of the current and past market. Meaning we will look into what other homes similar to the one you would be selling in your area. How long ago did they sell, how long have they been on the market, what type of condition it is the house in? We compare and give or take away value based on differences each home has, such as square footage, bedrooms, baths, garage size, pool, upgrades, etc.

For example:

If you feel your home is worth $160,000, 1000 sq ft, 2 bedroom, 1 bath, garage and large yard say 75x100, and has many upgrades such as new kitchen, bath fixtures.

The home down the street just sold for $175,000k, 1200 sq ft, 3 bedroom, 1 bath, garage 65x90 lot, pool, and no upgrades.

We would compare these two houses.

• 200 more sq ft would add to the price
• 1 extra bed would add to price
• Pool would add to price
• No upgrades would subtract from price
• Smaller lot would subtract from price

This is just an example of what we could do to compare homes and analysis what a good price for your home. Many more factors can come into play. Each home is treated on an individual bases and would be compared to a least 3 comparative homes.  Comparing houses can work both ways. It would be different for each home compared to, but we would find homes that are very similar to each other.