Innovation in the Real Estate Market

It seems to me that the Real Estate market has remain stagnant for the past couple of hundred years. You can argue that selling a home can't be change. The process is designed to be straight forward. The realtor pulls a listing for the client, the client finds the home of their dreams (or similar that they can afford) and the deal is close.

Granted they have been some technological innovations along the way, you have realtor.com allowing buyers to find the home without the need to wait for the realtor, you have zillow allowing buyers to estimate approximate cost of the houses in the area and comparables. This Web sites are quite well designed and allow the user to customize their searches. Then, you have the technology to drive by the home and listen to the audio tour from your car, etc... However, the process still remains the same, find a home and buy it.

There is nothing wrong with the process, except for the difficult task of finding the home. Comes the Realtor, this is where the problems begin. I have bought my share of homes in the past; I have experience good agents, bad agents, and of course snotty agents. However, nothing compares to the agent I encountered this past Sunday. There is a house in my neighborhood which recently was purchased, remodeled and quickly placed on the market up for sale once again. Although I'm not currently in the market to buy a house, I was curious to see what they had done to this home. After all, they purchased the home for $299 and now have place the house up for grabs at a astounding $429K. This is unheard off, after all, they did not change the size of the house and simply resided and fix up the kitchen. I needed to see this house.

We were driving by on our way to the store when we noticed the open house sign, we thought we had our opportunity. We get out of the car to find a very downward slopping porch, we continue to walk in through the already open front door and find ourselves in the very disjointed kitchen. There we encountered the Real Estate Agent. This lady was not having a good day. She quickly asks us if we are in the market or are we from the neighborhood. We replied, we are from down the street and were interested in... We didn't finished the sentence when she quickly states, the owner of the house has requested that neighbors not disturb the open house and please come back when she is present. I thought to myself, how rude! I then proceeded to state that although we are not currently looking, we know people who are looking, in addition, although a drive-by potentially is not looking they could potentially fall in love with the place and choose to buy! At this time, however, I have become quite aggravated and have started to head out the door. The Agent, flustered, follows us out and I'm quick to say, sorry lady, you should not be profiling first and second should now how to talk to potential clients.

The bottom line is that it doesn't matter what business you're in, referrals, referrals, referrals, is the name of the game. If I behaved in the manner this lady did, I be out of a job, before I could say "WAIT." Here is the listing, not that I want you to buy it, but I feel for the poor homeowners who have put their confidence and trust on such an agent.