September 05, 2007

realtors - the least trusted profession on earth


Remember just a year or two back when we were in all kinds of silly debates with simple-minded little realtors about whether a housing bubble existed or not? When you were called a brown shirt, chicken little or bitter renter if you spoke out against the bubble and the REIC?

Skip forward to today, and now the realtors are f*cked, their lies having been exposed, their livelihoods destroyed, and now they're calling for a federal taxpayer bailout of the housing gamblers.

From "there is no bubble" to "save us - we're crashing and need government help!"

realtors. No longer needed. And no longer trusted.

29 comments:

Anonymous said...

I agree that we don't need Realtors (TM) with their proprietary MLS listings, but real estate agents are a needed profession in civilized countries, as a service to sellers who had to move, to companies who relocate staff, to people who rather spend money than time on the footwork of house hunting. I hope, as you, for the implosion of the Realtors and for the emergence of a diversified service sector for house buyers (Zillow, agents and many others).

Out at the peak said...

Help-U-Sell was a great service to me. Sure, I had to do my own open house, but I saved $19K. You can do it cheaper via FSBO, but they knew what they were doing in terms of paperwork, negotiating on my behalf, and sending out ads.

Anonymous said...

Bought and sold by myself. Used a NOLO Guide - they're great.

http://www.nolo.com/index.cfm

Anonymous said...

Here, another one for your list. You "family values" Republican sheeple are a bunch of geniuses!

" (AP) Jenne, a former powerhouse legislator who was once considered a contender for governor, resigned Tuesday after he agreed to plead guilty to mail fraud conspiracy and tax evasion charges stemming from a two-year federal probe into his personal finances.

Jenne, a lawyer who spent most of his life in public service, also will likely lose his Florida Bar license and sheriff's pension because of the pending felony conviction. His pension is estimated to be about $125,000 a year.

Court documents filed Tuesday paint a portrait of a once-revered public servant who began his ''scheme to personally enrich himself'' in 1998 after he left a legal practice with influential Republican attorney William Scherer. Scherer's law firm continued to pay tens of thousands of dollars in auto loan and insurance payments on Jenne's Mercedes-Benz from 1998 through 2002 and then again in 2004, according to prosecutors.

Other unreported income, according to court records: $5,500 paid by one BSO vendor through one of the sheriff's secretaries in 2004; $10,000 in consulting fees received from a business venture involving a second BSO vendor in 2002; and $8,130 in a gift from that second BSO vendor who paid to demolish a Lake Worth home owned by the sheriff in 2001.

Jenne also turned to a vendor, Philip Procacci, and asked him to lend another BSO secretary $20,000 -- money she gave to the sheriff to help cover his income-tax bill in 2004, according to the charges. Procacci, who controls multimillion-dollar leases on three buildings to the BSO, told investigators that he believed the loan was intended for Jenne's secretary and was unaware she gave the money to her boss.

Jenne repaid the money through the secretary after Florida Department of Law Enforcement investigators began to question him about his personal finances in the spring of 2005.

In May 2005, in an interview with investigators, ''Jenne falsely stated he had no recollection about the $20,000 received from [the secretary] in April 2004,'' prosecutors said."

Anonymous said...

Often true. However when I sold my house at the peak of the bubble my agent was a huge, huge help. We had a troubled house, I knew what was coming, and I had to get rid of it as I knew I wouldn't have a second chance. If it wasn't for him we would be stuck there for a long time to come.

Anonymous said...

yes i have used realtors and i trust those sons of bitches about as much as i trust car salesmaen and television preachers.....

Bill said...

Hmm home sale down a meager 12.2%...nice fudged Number....wait till August comes in I predict a 30% haircut...who in their right mind is buying in this market non the less getting the Financing.

Bill said...

Rumor. stricly rumor:

CFC to cut 20K jobs.

Paige Turner said...

Early in 2007, The National Ass. of Realtwhores® was proclaiming that everything in the real estate gambling industry was sunshine, lollipops and rainbows. For the first time in history, it was a great time to buy AND sell. It was all about lucky winners -- there were no losers.

Now, the NAR is talking about "the crisis in the mortgage industry" and congratulating President Daddy Warbucks for his inspired leadership qualities:

"The National Association of Realtors® strongly commends President Bush for his leadership in proposing a set of policies designed to ease the crisis in the mortgage industry and halt the rapidly increasing rate of foreclosures affecting many American families today."

WHAT THE FU*K !?!

We went from riches to rags in less than 6 months and NOBODY in the NAR saw this coming?

V.L.

Anonymous said...

NAR did not see crash coming because they were too busy counting their price-fixing 6% commissions. Real estate agents are blood-suckers and provide little value to anyone.

doby

Anonymous said...

.



I remember going to cocktail parties years ago where there were (on occasion) airline pilots, surgeons, high ranking military or very wealthy people there.

But, it was the realtors that would wander through the crowd announcing who they were and always had plenty of newly printed business cards to hand out!



Die hard or die trying!




.

Anonymous said...

I prefer the following tagline:

Realtors: The World's 2nd Oldest Profession!

Anonymous said...

With a car salesman at least you know up front that the car will go down in value

Anonymous said...

Jesus was a carpenter not a REALTOR

Anonymous said...

Anybody catch this show "Flippin Out" on Bravo? It is fun to watch the obnoxious real estate investor
complain about buyers and having to downsize his house and thanking the realtor for taking a commision cut to make the deal happen. The next season should be interesting.

The blogs on the show are hillarious. What world are they in?
http://www.bravotv.com/blog/milliondollarlisting/2007/08/post.php

Anonymous said...

I resent that. As an antique,coin, and used car dealer I maintain that I am least trusted. Sure, when a realtor screws you its for your life savings...

Ok you may be right...

Screw realtors.

Anonymous said...

I just got done serviceing a realtor.

Realtors have connections to crooked appraisors who can hit the numbers for you.What if you list your house fsbo and you get ahold of an honest appraisor who says your house is worth 50k less.You could have used a realtor who know the good appraiors who will get you top dollar.That alone makes it worht hireiong a realtor.They know the good pest inspectors and home inspectors too. Excuse me why I go back for seconds this morning.

Anonymous said...

keith you might like this
a chart charting realtors
tinyurl.com/2n7y76

Anonymous said...

BwaHaHaHaHa! If you click on the link that is the subject of this article, at the bottom of the page, "discussion forum" you will find a posting by "TamaraEastep" that says "feeling tired".

Click on it if you want a laugh. She says "Have you found that this is the most exhausting year to have worked in the profession?"

Hmmm. I thought "the profession" usually means "the world's oldest profession" :)))

But then again, take a look at her (her picture is there with the posting) and think "maybe not". Not likely she'd get too much business. Certainly not mine :)))

OTOH, take a look at the next post down "Real Estate Blogs......Which ones are worthwhile?" and check out the chick that runs the blog "Kayla OBrien". Now, SHE'S a hottie! I think she'd do OK in "the profession".

As for Tamara, back to WalMart....

Anonymous said...

David Faber,

Right on target with the appraiser, home inspector, agent collusion. Anyone who is not on board to "make the deal go" is not used and word is spread no to use hime / her. Trouble is during the last 5 year frenzy many times the buyer wanted the appraiser, inspector, etc. to "make the deal go"

I emplore any future buyers to get their own appraisal "not for lending purposes" when they decide to buy a house. Do not trust your lender's appraiser. Their future workload depends upon them hitting "the number" Why would someone not spend 350-600 dollars to avoid a tens of thousands of dollars mistake?

More schadenfreude will be avialable to all!

Cheers

Socalappraiser

Anonymous said...

Vote for Clinton. She will pay for everybody's mortgage and bring back the dotcom boom.

Mammoth said...

Note that collusion can also work against a realtor. This is from a week ago, but worthy of a repost since it's right on topic.

Feel free to skip over this (except if you're a realtor) if you read this last week.
----------------------
As I recently posted, the tenants moved out of my rental house after 6 years, so I decided to make it pretty and put it on the market. Yes - a bit late to the game, but ‘Seattle is different,’ (sarcasm turned off) and worse comes to worse, if after 2 months it doesn’t sell then I can just rent it out again. Had it 10 years so it will be cash-flow positive.

Anyway, yes I confess I was working with a realtor but hadn’t signed anything with him. This was the guy who I bought the house through back in 1997. He works with first-time buyers, and his angle is to keep in touch with them through the years so that when they finally go to sell, they hire him as their agent.

He recommended a drywall repairman to spruce up the interior – just some minor stuff like the drywall tape coming loose & fixing some dings & scratches in the walls.

Well, this guy did a sh1tty job and didn’t clean up after himself; left a mess everywhere he worked inside the house. Nothing major, mind you, but it pissed me off.

So I called the agent and gave him an earful. Of course he apologized all up and down, as this must’ve scared him into thinking that he was going to lose “his” commission. Apparently he contacted the repairman, because he called me.

I told this bozo in no uncertain terms exactly what the problem was, and would you believe this @sshole had the nerve to argue? I listened really, really hard during this phone call and never once heard the words, “I’m sorry.” That did it!

Hence, yesterday I had the agent meet me at the house and showed him the bits of paint, dried drops of drywall mud, overspray, and plaster & sanding dust all over the carpet and on the brand-new bathroom floor that I just laid down. Then I pointed out the stuff sprayed into the electrical wall outlets and the excess drywall mud this jerk dumped under a bush in front of the house.

The agent feigned outrage and again apologized. I told him that this shabby work was not what I had expected from somebody whom he referred me to. And furthermore, I also let him know how disappointed I was in having trusted him, pointed out that his is the kind of stuff that will damage his reputation, and THAT HIS SERVICES WERE NO LONGER NEEDED.

Man, you should have seen the look on his face – it was like in the cartoons, where there is a picture of a dollar bill with wings, flying away toward the horizon.
--------------
Any realtors reading this? Yes…I thought so. Keep in mind that today’s seller has PLENTY of available agents to choose from, and also now has a better chance at selling WITHOUT an agent than ever before. So you may want to think twice before recommending that moron you know who does home repairs and kicks back to you a percentage of his takings, because it may backfire right in your face, just as it did for this realtor who stayed in touch with me for ten years thinking I owed him something.

-Mammoth

Paul E. Math said...

Hey, c'mon now. There are some good realtors. In fact there are plenty of good realtors... in the cemetery.

Anonymous said...

Don't hire any realtor that has not passed "The Tedst!"

http://www.tedtruitt.com/

s said...

A True Story about an Honest Realtor, Circa 2005


We moved to a mid-bubble area in '05. I researched real estate agents (as much as is possible) before the move and picked the one who sounded best. We looked at around 100 houses. All the houses fell quickly into a few categories. Overpriced, overpriced dumps or sold before we could make a move At least twice we were ready to bid on a house that sucked just to end our agony, our realtor stopped us.

One Sunday while driving around we found a rental, entirely by accident. It was priced well and we signed the lease.

That Monday we gave our agent a very, very expensive gift and our news. She acted delighted. About a six months ago I ran into her, she said we'd made the best choice of our lives, even though she wasn't sure at the time we were right. At the point we gave up the bubble bust was only a belief of the paranoid.

There aren't many honest people out there, but there are some.

PS When this nightmare is over, I'll call her to help.

Anonymous said...

The realtor commission isn't something held in placed by a monopoly. It's simply a highest bidder proposition. If you are selling your house, a buyer's realtor is going to show his customer houses with the highest commission.

I had the mistaken idea of using a budget broker to sell our house but the wife thrashed me soundly with the above advice I'm giving you.

Until ALL the commissions come down, the realtors are going to gravitate toward the highest commission payers.

Wouldn't you?

Anonymous said...

Wha! Wha! what a lot of whiners, nobody spitting out this bull when things were good. Typical American shoot first ask questions later then shi* all over the messenger. For your information the average Realtor in the US has a take home pay around %50k a year. most are barely making a living sellimg about 7 homes a year. The real money goes to the banks and still is. They are the blood suckers. canuk realtor

Anonymous said...

LOL nice one Paul!
Seriously, the local Mercedes dealership reports 6 repos from "realtors" in the last month (Sac CA area). About time these frauds left the business.

Me - my two family cars are free & clear - a '01 BMW and a '03 Toyota 4Runner. I won't buy a car I can't ay cash for.

Anonymous said...

I passed the Tedst! Don't know what that says about me.

Remind me to donate my white suit to Goodwill... :)