Realtor help!

[AnnieFC]

Now that my family and friends are visiting, they are considering finding a little piece of paradise for themselves. I didn’t love my realtor and hoping someone can recommend someone who will do it for less than 5%. Mahalo!

[PaulW]

They should look on Zillow and try to connect to owners directly, 0% commission.
Sorry, I have yet to meet an even half-competent realtor in Hawaii.

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

I don't know that Hawaii Information Service will help your friends find a low commission realtor, but it does have all the MLS listings which they can search themselves:

https://www.alohaliving.com/search/


Craig's List for sale by owner:

https://honolulu.craigslist.org/search/big/reo

[jrw]

If you do craigslist make sure you due all your homework and their is a lot of rip off on there

jrw

[lquade]

you must be from some part of the country where a buyers agent is the norm... here typically, the seller pays the 6% commission, not the buyer. your realtor is representing you... don't know what area you are looking in, myself i have used terri braugher at century 21 for many years.. she is very knowledgeable and answers all your questions. sorry you must have had a bad experience, but as long as you use an escrow service and read what you are signing you shouldn't really have a problem here...

[Mac2017]

Long story short, I found my home on my own and contacted the owners realtor Nani Maloof from Island wide associates and dealt directly with her. She was VERY honest and upfront with everything. Including the negatives with the home, not just the positives. The deal went through flawlessly and I have nothing but good things to say even though she was the sellers realtor. I can’t remember what her percentage was for her services, but I will say, you generally get what you pay for.

I have learned over my years that saving a little will cost you more in the long run. Choose wisely by evaluating the totality of the circumstances.

[terracore]

"the seller pays the 6% commission, not the buyer"

In every property I've ever sold, I've passed the commission onto the buyer by raising the sales price to cover the commission. I'm pretty sure that's what everybody does. The fallacy that the "seller pays the commission" is just realtor-speak for "buyer actually pays in the end".

All things are negotiable. Some realtors won't budge on their commission, you are free to choose somebody else. A friend of mine, as a home seller, negotiated the realtor down to 1.5%, and actually down to 0.5% if he found the buyer himself. (He did his own open houses). Of course what he couldn't negotiate down was the % for the buyer's realtor if it was a different realtor than his.

The following statement isn't going to make me any friends from the realtor business, but really a realtor is just somebody who unlocks a door and lets you look at a house... does that seem all that complicated like they deserve 5 or 6% of a purchase price? You can train a dog to open a door for you. Ouch, I said that. I remember when we hired a realtor to sell a house in Alaska after watching some episodes of "Selling New York" where realtors actually spend money and work to sell properties we were better educated and after a snow storm and before a showing, asked her if she was going to shovel the driveway herself or hire somebody. She was flabbergasted! But somebody plowed the driveway and shoveled the walks before the showing. The house sold itself in a couple of days, she probably made about $5000.00/hour. The least she could have done was get somebody to make the driveway safe to navigate so at least we made her take care of that. This was before we were educated enough to negotiate commission. On our next sale we paid a flat rate that probably amounted to about 1.3%.

Of course there is no snow here, but properties need mowing and landscaping. All properties are different. You might have difficulty finding a realtor willing to put in any effort to sell a Puna shack even at a 10% commission. Know your property and the market before negotiating.

ETA: I've fired 7 Hawaii realtors... one I kept was John Erickson from Remax. Not sure if he negotiates rates but he lives in Puna and knows the area. Also gave us a bunch of banana plants as a housewarming gift.

[Rob Tucker]

Actually, the sales price not the same as a listing price. The sale price is the price the buyer agrees to pay.

Just FYI

[EightFingers]

The title company does all the paperwork.
Real estate agents do not work for either the buyer or seller, they work for themselves. The quicker you understand that, the better off you’ll be.
Also beware of home inspectors. Not all of them are on the buyer’s side.

Puna: Our roosters crow first

[MarkD]

"A friend of mine, as a home seller, negotiated the realtor down to 1.5%, and actually down to 0.5% if he found the buyer himself."

- - - -

My understanding is if you have a buyer and seller agreeable on a deal, you can sometimes go directly to a title company and get them to do all the paperwork at reasonable cost. (The title search to ensure that the title is clear is very important.)

I'm told sometimes the title companies balk, because the real estate industry lobbies them to work only with realtors. Not sure what the situation is on this in Hilo.