Know Your Market

by Darrin DeRoches August 9 - 15, 2012

Real estate listing has been low for the past couple of months. This week a client of mine called about a property in the west end and, after looking on our system, I could not find it. I proceeded to check the e–mail to see if I had the wrong address and once confirmed, I checked again – still no listing. I did a history check on the property and even looked at the old agent’s current listings – still no new listing. I finally went on the MLS system and found the listing. It was listed with an out of town agent. That may seem to be no big deal but in the end it may have cost the seller ten thousand dollars or more. I am not knocking on an out of town agent but after talking with the seller and other agents about the property, it became very apparent that the seller would have made ten thousand more. If it starts to sound like sour grapes since my client did not have a chance to bid on the property – it isn’t. It was not a case of “you snooze you lose” but rather a case of an out of town agent not realizing the local market conditions.      The property is located in the west end of Hamilton which presently has a shortage of listings. It was priced under $200,000 which makes it very attractive to a large amount of buyers. It was listed on the weekend in a different real estate board, not Hamilton. So the only way to know about the listing was on the MLS or driving by the sign. The seller had a couple of showings and received an immediate offer $9,000 under asking.     In the meantime, myself and a couple of other agents showed the property only to be told an offer had been accepted. Again no sour grapes, but the agent did not give the property proper exposure and then accepting an offer under asking – lost the seller a lot of money. I spoke with the agent and the seller and asked to be informed if the original offer falls apart to call us since we would be willing to make a strong offer immediately.      I had to ask the owner how she selected the agent and she told me it was her daughter’s friend. I told her it was hard to find her listing and she told me the agent had it on the Hamilton system but it was not. I was tempted to explain to her that I and the other agent I spoke with would have offered full price or more to secure the property. It was not my place to explain the mistakes made and the reality of making more money but it should teach us a lesson. Friends are friends and business is business.     So if you are looking to sell your property and get top dollar for it, consider using a broker who works full time in your market and understands the present market conditions. In this case, the seller left thousands of dollars on the table.  V     Darrin DeRoches is a local real estate and mortgage broker. He can be reached to answer questions, comments or stories about real estate experiences through this weekly column at mail@uniquerealty.ca.