> What if it’s your buddy who makes sure the problems in the house are never known so you can close the sale?

We don’t refer our “buddies”. If a client is that distrustful, we can’t effectively help them because our way of helping people assumes they trust us and know that EVERYTHING we do is done in their best interest.

Should people trust every Realtor? No. This is where the ability of the consumer to evaluate and hire a Realtor is important. Most, according to NAR surveys, simply hire the first one to return an email or phone call. That’s not a good predictor of a Realtor’s skill and trustworthiness, and it’s a poor way to choose a Realtor.

Karen, I’m with you on the drama aspect. Much more drama resulting from confusion and unexpected problems exists when we’re dealing with players we don’t know or trust.

More importantly, our trusted vendors fix screwups immediately without effort on our part. Most recently, one of our lenders failed to inform us that not all of the seller paid closing costs could be used up at closing by our buyer. This caused our buyer to need $500 additional at closing than they had budgeted.

Sylvia made one phone call to the lender and said “you need to make this right”. The lender said “I know, and I will”. And the lender showed up at closing with a check for $500, as rebate of some of the fees. Problem solved.

We don’t have that kind of leverage with a lender the buyer finds through the internet., which is why we want our buyers to use our lenders, so we can make sure they don’t get screwed by some faceless out of state internet lender, as has happened.

Steve

Contractors and estimates are different. I would give buyers several names I’ve worked with before and insist they also ask their friends and interview all those inspectors. Just telling them about one and making strong recommendation is not very responsible.