The Top Five Questions to Ask Your Listing Agent Before You Hire

Selling a home correctly requires a skilled professional. A selling real estate agent can make your job as a seller a whole lot easier, but only if you hire the right agent. That’s right – not all agents are created equal! Before you put the sale of your home in the hands of someone else, be sure that you’re comfortable with them and that they are qualified to sell your home.

1.Do you work full time as a real estate agent?

Hiring your friend’s part time real estate agent acquaintance may seem like a good idea at first, until they don’t have time to negotiate your deal because they are at their day job. When you want your home to sell quickly, you need someone who is completely dedicated to the job and has the full time experience to help you.

2.How many years have you been in real estate? Can you show me your professional designations? Can you refer me to your previous clients?

These questions all go together because they can give you a good sense of the agent’s success rates. The number of years that they have been working are important because it will let you know what experience level they have and professional designations will clue you into their level of professionalism. Good real estate agents have clients that sing their praises.

3.Do you have a website and will you be marketing my property online? If so, how will you do that?

In this day and age, successful real estate agents know that most buyers go to the Internet to find their next home. Your selling agent should have a website to market their properties and have a strong online marketing plan in order to put your home in front of web browsers. The marketing plan should include a dedicated web page about your property and then a plan for listing your property on all of the major real estate websites (like Realtor.com and Zillow.com). Even if you know nothing about real estate online, your real estate agent should.

4.How will you determine the price of my home?

Setting the price for a home is one of the most important issues in selling a home. You should understand the agents’ method for setting the price for your home. To prepare yourself for the possible price, try to look at other listings in your area so you won’t be shocked.

5.Do you have any kind of performance guarantee? Can I end my listing with you if I’m unsatisfied with the results?

Although no one wants to start off a relationship with a selling agent thinking about bad results, it does happen sometimes. You have the right to know what will happen if such a situation arises. Most good real estate agents have a clear plan for ending a relationship if the house isn’t sold within a certain amount of time.

While asking these questions can’t 100% guarantee that you’ll find the right selling agent, you’ll definitely get closer to finding the right person by quizzing them.

About the Author:
Joe Cline writes articles for Austin Texas Realtor. Other articles written by the author related to Cedar Park real estate and Austin real estate can be found on the net.