Daily I receive phone calls and numerous online inquiries regarding buying a home in Utah. As I help people every now and than I will bump into a big surprise. Someone is looking for homes, has all sorts of questions, and wants me to do all the work in finding them a home. Now that isnt the surprise. The surprise is that when I ask if they have a Realtor they are using they say yes. Why would they be calling me when they have a Realtor? So I ask, and here are the answers that I get,
a. My agent does this part time.
b. I have a family member that is an agent.
c. My agent is new.
d. My agent is on vacation.
e. I cant reach my agent.
f. My agent isnt sending me anything I like.
g. My friends dad or brothers uncle is an agent.
What Your Realtor or Agent is supposed to do when you are looking for a home:
Your agent represents you. The person listing a home for sale represents the seller. Builders have agents that represent the builder. Whenever you buy a home you want to have an agent that represents you.
Here are two guidelines on what your agent is supposed to do when starting to help you.
1. Free your time by looking for your home and sending you listings. (They should have access to anything for sale. There shouldnt be any reason why you would need to look at other agents websites or other home magazines or newspapers for a home. The newspapers, magazines, and everything are a waste of time. Your Realtor should be able to give you homes every day!)
2. Make it so that you only have 1 person to call instead of having 10 agents calling you all trying to get you to buy their listings.
If your Realtor is finding you homes for sale and making all the phone calls for you, good on them! If they aren't...why are you doing the work?
(This isnt the main job of a Realtor but its a good sign of the other services they are going to provide. If they do a great job from the beginning, your success probability of a great experience will skyrocket. If they arent doing the the 2 things above....I wish you all the luck in the world.)