All Forum Posts by: Jason Tinder

Quote from @Charlie MacPherson:

Former Realtor here, so no dog in this particular hunt.  It really was always negotiable. 

I can't count how many times I met with a seller and said my commission is X% (and I'll pay the buyer's agent out of that), and they replied that so-and-so says they only charge Y%.  Can you beat that?

At that point, I recalculate.  I have to decide whether I take less, offer the buyer's agent less of both or walk away from the listing.  I have done all of the those, based on the circumstances.

I also can't count the number of times in mandatory training / continuing education that I was told that we were never, ever, under any circumstances to discuss setting "standard" commissions with other agents.  In fact, in my pre-licensing course in Mass, the instructor said that if we were ever in a setting with other agents, like a gathering at a bar, and someone said something like "you know, we should all agree to a minimum of Z%" that we were to loudly and publicly excuse ourselves.

Business brokering is so much more fun - and we charge a lot more commission too!

Ok. So as the seller, you could negotiate. But what about the buyer whose commission is seemingly free? Could they negotiate that lower? No, only the seller could have. But if you didn’t pay enough to the buyer’s agent, what happened? I won’t rehash the whole lawsuit here, but the outcome often wasn’t great for the seller. So the cost was maybe even baked into the home price, which the buyer pays.

Bottom line is this: the courts found that the  industry illegally conspired to keep commissions high. That means things weren’t quite as negotiable as they should have been.

I see so many agents saying nothing has changed, it’s always been negotiable so nothing will change. They vow to uphold the old system, even though it has been ruled illegal. They plan to continue what’s been ruled illegal through clever workarounds and ticking boxes on forms differently.

I’m just frankly shocked at what’s coming out of their mouths - almost as if the law is this silly little thing that the courts enforce because they can’t see the light properly as an agent does.

I say all of this as a licensed agent. I have my license to avoid exorbitant fees on my own deals (as much as I can).

Quote from @Stephen Montez:

Quote from @Jason Tinder:

Quote from @Stephen Montez:

Quote from @Kris B.:

Question for agents. What's your take on no more 6% commission and how this will change the way you operate?

Agents who provide the most value to the marketplace have nothing to worry about and still going to command the majority of business. Just getting rid of a lot of the agents who are one-foot out of the door any way or those who were getting by doing the minimum. As someone who's focused on building out a business for decades to come -- I'm thankful for there being a higher standard we should all be held to. 

PS - Commission rates were and are always negotiable, its a misconception that ONLY 6% could be charged or that it could no longer be charged  -- I wouldn't be shocked to still see 6% commission rates moving forward. 

 I drives me mad when agents claim "comission rates were always negotiable". We just had a giant lawsuit that showed how difficult it was to negotiate the fees, and the steps realtors took to prevent buyers from easily doing so. And how the system would create negative outcomes for those who did negotiate lower fees.

 I've worked for 6%, 5%, all the way down to 2% in commissions. Hard doesn't mean not negotiable and the entirety of negotiating a deal is hard anyway, it should be. I'm not disagreeing that changes should have been made, I'm in favor of them. But the facts of the situation are the facts of the situation, that's all I'm trying to share. Best of luck!

 What drives me mad is that they say "well, it was always negotiable" and try to gaslight everyone, as if it's all the people out there who just couldn't be bothered to negotiate. If only you had negotiated better, maybe you wouldn't have gotten yourself into that mess - you have nobody to blame but yourself. The comments pretend that all of the barriers that brought about the lawsuit never existed. 

Quote from @Stephen Montez:

Quote from @Kris B.:

Question for agents. What's your take on no more 6% commission and how this will change the way you operate?

Agents who provide the most value to the marketplace have nothing to worry about and still going to command the majority of business. Just getting rid of a lot of the agents who are one-foot out of the door any way or those who were getting by doing the minimum. As someone who's focused on building out a business for decades to come -- I'm thankful for there being a higher standard we should all be held to. 

PS - Commission rates were and are always negotiable, its a misconception that ONLY 6% could be charged or that it could no longer be charged  -- I wouldn't be shocked to still see 6% commission rates moving forward. 

 I drives me mad when agents claim "comission rates were always negotiable". We just had a giant lawsuit that showed how difficult it was to negotiate the fees, and the steps realtors took to prevent buyers from easily doing so. And how the system would create negative outcomes for those who did negotiate lower fees.

Hey all - I'm also new to AR. I'll be moving into Bentonville in about a month and am already starting my search. Can anyone recommend a good agent that they use? Preferably someone who has worked with multifamily property investors. I'd like to find a "house hacking" situation after my arrival.

Also, I'm glad to hear that there is a REIA group in the area.

Nice! Thanks for putting this together, I'll be there!

Eric,

I'm not exactly sure what's meant by "rental website", but in general, search engines like more content on one website. Your one site will rank better in terms of your local keywords than if you had two sites. Two sites with mediocre ranking are worth less than one site with better ranking because most users don't dig very far into search results.

Lead generation often needs a squeeze page where the user enters their information and doesn't isn't presented with links for browsing the rest of the site. You can easily create squeeze pages within your domain by simply not adding any links on those pages and adding the form elements that you need.

Joel Owens - I just dug up this old thread. Thanks for the software recommendation. It's not often that I drop a hundred bones just because someone says something is good. But it looks pretty legit, so here goes...

You can definitely get a higher rate of return. If it were me, I would sell the land and use the proceeds as a down payment on something large - an apartment complex. I would start looking for your purchase (after a bit of learning), and make the purchase subject to your selling your land. Use a 1031 exchange, as you mentioned. You could put 25% down on up to $2.4 million in property. From there, you'll need to learn to manage the managers. Using leverage will help you to get better returns. Make money using other people's money.

Hey, Marco Santarelli, great stuff here. I'll be checking out your market report soon. Cash flow and appreciation are both great, but if I had to pick one that means more to me, it's cash flow. Multi-families are preferable. I've heard great things about Texas, Indiana, and a few other markets. I'll see what your report has to say as well. Thanks for posting that, by the way.

I took a look at your site. Looks like you're in all the right markets. I'll reach out as I narrow down a bit.

A big welcome. I'm pretty new to the site as well, and have only been registered for a week or so. So far, it's been great, as I've had a lot of questions answered. I'm in the Beaverton area, but Portland investing doesn't seem to offer the greatest returns available, so I'm shopping other markets to see what else is out there. Best of luck on the journey.