Why You Should Hire a Real Estate Agent to Sell Your Tel Aviv Apartment
Sellers often ask me whether they should have their Tel Aviv home listed exclusively, and what are the benefits of hiring just one agent to represent them in the sale of their home.
This post is written with the intention of covering main aspects of exclusive listings, with the hope to give some clarity to home sellers considering working exclusively with an agent.
Unless you’re in the business of selling homes, having your home listed exclusively with an agent, is great to have if you do not want to be involved in the day-to-day process of selling your home.
Are you up for having to deal with your phone ring, answer questions, show your home to potential buyers (not to mention the emotions that come with it)? If so, then this post is probably not for you, and I urge you to read this post on ‘Four Mistakes to Avoid When Selling Your tel Aviv Apartment’ (Infographic)
If you’re just considering about putting your home up for sale or actively trying and finding it to be a daunting task than you’d imagine it to be – read on to find out more why working exclusively with an agent can be a huge benefit to the sale transaction.
When a buyer is in the market to buy, he usually sees several homes with similar features for comparison. The peak point comes when a buyer finds a home with most points (features) matching his criterias. The one criteria that is most difficult to overpass (and most crucial), which is most frustrating for sellers, is not being able to fully identify a buyer’s budget. Buyers see your home as a business transaction, and eventually are looking to buy a good deal, hence – buying good value for money.
It is paramount to accept that the actual sales transaction of your home eventually boils down to a business transaction – it is not personal, it’s “just” business.
No two people are alike and we often don’t see things eye to eye. With that in mind, what may seem as a good investment, a fabulous décor or a magnificent renovation to you, may not seem to another and given it is your home (!), sellers tend to get emotionally attached, and understandably so, often prolonging the negotiation process
Whether you’ll hire an agent to work with exclusively, or try selling your home on your own, no matter what your decision will eventually be, please take this piece of advice with you: Do not get offended by low-ball offers or comments you hear from potential buyers. Remember, it is in fact a business transaction and they are only looking for a good deal. And for this reason alone is why I almost always advise my clients to hand over their most priced asset to a skilled, professional agent.
What does exclusive listing means
The exclusive listing arrangement is your written authorization to the agent of sole rights or representation in the sale of your home. It means that all aspects relating to the sale will be handled or coordinated through this one organization acting on your behalf.
When selling exclusively, it covers a set period with one real estate agency allowing the agent to concentrate all their efforts into the sale of your home. Which is great, as it takes all the work and hassle from you.
Unlike selling your home privately, it limits the number of people you have to deal with, while at the same time allowing an increase in the number of sales personnel working for you to bring in qualified buyers.
Your home will be sold sooner
Now I know there are quite a few sellers out there who believe they can sell their home on their own, and save themselves the fees. I understand and respect that. However, bear in mind that it’s not just the emotional part of the sale that you need to deal with, which normally comes later in the process, but it’s your network and list of potential people who’d be interested in seeing your home first.
Viewings are tough. You take the time and effort of having your home all ready and airy, and if you have your home listed online, then you probably have a mixture of agents, potential buyers, and agents coming along with their buyers to inspect your home. An hour and a lot of questions later, you end up with no feedback which can be very frustrating as you’re left without knowing what all these people who were just in your home, think.
“Are they interested?” “Do they like it?” “Is my home priced right?”
And if you’re home has been on the market for quite a while now, and you’ve gone through these viewings several times, the frustration just keeps on building up, where eventually, you stop caring. You don’t put as much effort onto the next viewing and you find yourself in a loop…
These are real stories and situations that we, agents, encounter almost regularly.
True, there are exceptions, but why not avoid prolonged periods of inconvenience, expense and frustration, when you can increase your chances of actually selling your home faster by finding the right agent who has a solid network that caters to the right clientele?
The knack of negotiating
Unless you’re in sales and have high negotiation skills, negotiating on your home is really, really tough. As I wrote earlier, being emotionally attached is almost inevitable when it comes to your home, so why not avoid the inconvenience and bad feeling?
Nothing beats the services of a team of skilled, experienced sales people who can keep the doors of communication open between interested buyers and yourself.
Timing is vital!
Selling your home can be a complex process, even if all goes smoothly. Financing, payments, documentation, all has to be arranged on time and in orderly manner.
This is especially important if you’re a foreigner as you might not be accustomed to the way things are done in Tel Aviv. You should have your attorney involved, of course, but your attorney only comes in much later, once a preliminary agreement has been established between you and the buyer.
Your agent has a list of documents ready to present to potential buyers whenever needed, and should be ready to answer any questions, which again, takes all the hassle from you.
Quantity of buyers
This is a tricky one, as there are many sellers confused by the actual definition of “working exclusively”. Working exclusively does not mean you only have ONE agent working on your apartment, quite the contrary, the sole agent managing the sale on your behalf is super motivated and all his efforts are put towards the sale. It is much more than representation by just one person. It puts into action a whole network of professional real estate brokers who will be interested in your property for their clients, and who will already have numerous prospects lined up. Another advantage is, that both agents and potential buyers actually prefer working with agents who have exclusive listings as they’re confident they’ll be seeing listings that aren’t open to the entire market.
Quality of buyers
One of the main benefits of working exclusively, is knowing that your agent operates with a list of qualified and interested prospects. There is nothing worse than having masses of people tramping through your home who have no intentions of buying it.
In summary, Tel Aviv offers a long list of real estate agents operating in and around the city, and finding just the right one might involve some work, but once found, it’s up to the exclusive agent to eliminate any stress and hassle involved. It is his job to handle the entire process from A-Z: marketing, qualifying of prospects, viewings, answering questions, eliminating doubts and, above all else, keeping things moving.