Residential Real Estate Agent · Moriches, NY · Member since 2008 · 635 posts · 9 votes
19y
entering into an agency (agreement) with real estate broker that involves you as a buyer simply means that the broker is working on your behalf - meaning - you're the client and the sellers are customers.
a broker or a sales agent that you enter into a buyers agency with simply give the broker of record an exclusive right to help you - you can't go off and close on real estate without them - for you, this type of arrangement is good because you have the piece of mind that the broker/agent works for you (you hope - even with agency sometimes agents get mixed up with this because it's the little things that make or break agency).
as far as using an agent - they might be able to run comps for you, let you know certain things about a given area pertaining to rents, values, general info about the locale that may help you find the best for YOUR money.
know this about co-ops - you're not buying real estate - you're buying shares and in return you obtain a proprietary lease to a unit which is owned by the corp. so you don't get any deed - because you're not buying real property - you're buying shares, which is personal property - big difference.