L
Liana
Guest
I'm at my wits end.
We've (my husband and I) had our home listed for two months. We live in Ontario Canada. We interviewed a few agents before picking ours. She told us that the time we chose to list was EXCELLENT since there were VERY few sellers of homes out there. She told us that we could get within 96% of the asking price if we listed with her. She suggested an asking price ($148,000) and we negotiated a commission that all thought was fair ~ 4.5%.
A few days later she came back and said that she'd filled out some of the paperwork incorrectly so we corrected it and initialled it over again...it slowly became evident to us that she didn't know her business very well but we thought...she's the expert.
At the same time, she asked us to sign an agreement clause which provided her the right to any real estate fees from the purchase of our other home, if listed with an agent. We thought, Sure...if you're our agent, why should the sellers agent get a commission if you brought us there?
Two months went by and it became clear that she had totally missed the mark on the asking price. She advised us to lower the price and we did very willingly. Then three open houses later she told us that our house was priced incorrectly again. In the interim we had about $250.00 worth of merchandise go missing from our property during the open houses. We took this as part of the risk of doing business.
She then took down information on the type of home we were looking to buy. Once a week she would bring by little clippings of homes. None of which was what we were looking for. In one case, we actually went to see a home (which was way overpriced and very low quality...she brought us this same clipping three times...even after it had sold).
During our last open house, we took the opportunity to look at open homes. We saw a home that we ABSOLUTELY LOVED and then found out that it was a private listing. I immediately phoned our agent to tell her that we were serious about an offer and that we wanted to know if there would be any outstanding financial burdens if we went ahead with a private offer. Although ahe was disappointed, she said, 'no'. The morning after the offer was made, we called her to tell her the details. She told us that if we wanted our house to sell quickly we'd have to lower it by another $10,000. Again we said ok....she said she'd bring the revised paperwork by for us to sign. When she got to our home, she told us that because we had purchased this home privately, we had to pay her a full commission of 6% on the total new selling price ($135000) otherwise she wouldn't sell our home...she would hang on to the listing until it expired (mid June '00)...which would put us in a VERY bad spot (we bought firm). Although we didn't bring it up, she said..'and if you want out of OUR contract I want you to pay me 3% of the new asking price ~ $3600.00!! For her inability to price, market and sell our home. I feel that we are being blamed for her recommendation of dropping the price so much...I believe that she knows she wont get the commission she thought she would and now we are being made to suffer for her incompetence.
I spoke to her broker this morning and the broker said that the agent isn't making hardly anything on our business so why would she try hard for you?
As far as we're concerned, our contract says 4.5% not 6%. I feel she lied to us to get our business and is extorting us now that she knows we need to sell our home. We've dropped the price $13000 on an original price of ~$148000! There is nothing in the other contract which says we can't buy a home privately if we want to.
What can we recommend to these people inorder to get us out of this mess? To top things off, I'm 7.5 months pregnant and this whole ordeal is stressing me out. I've tried to communicate openly, honestly and timely with my agent...always following her lead always taking her suggestions but I feel like we're being taken great advantage of at our most vulnerable time.
We've (my husband and I) had our home listed for two months. We live in Ontario Canada. We interviewed a few agents before picking ours. She told us that the time we chose to list was EXCELLENT since there were VERY few sellers of homes out there. She told us that we could get within 96% of the asking price if we listed with her. She suggested an asking price ($148,000) and we negotiated a commission that all thought was fair ~ 4.5%.
A few days later she came back and said that she'd filled out some of the paperwork incorrectly so we corrected it and initialled it over again...it slowly became evident to us that she didn't know her business very well but we thought...she's the expert.
At the same time, she asked us to sign an agreement clause which provided her the right to any real estate fees from the purchase of our other home, if listed with an agent. We thought, Sure...if you're our agent, why should the sellers agent get a commission if you brought us there?
Two months went by and it became clear that she had totally missed the mark on the asking price. She advised us to lower the price and we did very willingly. Then three open houses later she told us that our house was priced incorrectly again. In the interim we had about $250.00 worth of merchandise go missing from our property during the open houses. We took this as part of the risk of doing business.
She then took down information on the type of home we were looking to buy. Once a week she would bring by little clippings of homes. None of which was what we were looking for. In one case, we actually went to see a home (which was way overpriced and very low quality...she brought us this same clipping three times...even after it had sold).
During our last open house, we took the opportunity to look at open homes. We saw a home that we ABSOLUTELY LOVED and then found out that it was a private listing. I immediately phoned our agent to tell her that we were serious about an offer and that we wanted to know if there would be any outstanding financial burdens if we went ahead with a private offer. Although ahe was disappointed, she said, 'no'. The morning after the offer was made, we called her to tell her the details. She told us that if we wanted our house to sell quickly we'd have to lower it by another $10,000. Again we said ok....she said she'd bring the revised paperwork by for us to sign. When she got to our home, she told us that because we had purchased this home privately, we had to pay her a full commission of 6% on the total new selling price ($135000) otherwise she wouldn't sell our home...she would hang on to the listing until it expired (mid June '00)...which would put us in a VERY bad spot (we bought firm). Although we didn't bring it up, she said..'and if you want out of OUR contract I want you to pay me 3% of the new asking price ~ $3600.00!! For her inability to price, market and sell our home. I feel that we are being blamed for her recommendation of dropping the price so much...I believe that she knows she wont get the commission she thought she would and now we are being made to suffer for her incompetence.
I spoke to her broker this morning and the broker said that the agent isn't making hardly anything on our business so why would she try hard for you?
As far as we're concerned, our contract says 4.5% not 6%. I feel she lied to us to get our business and is extorting us now that she knows we need to sell our home. We've dropped the price $13000 on an original price of ~$148000! There is nothing in the other contract which says we can't buy a home privately if we want to.
What can we recommend to these people inorder to get us out of this mess? To top things off, I'm 7.5 months pregnant and this whole ordeal is stressing me out. I've tried to communicate openly, honestly and timely with my agent...always following her lead always taking her suggestions but I feel like we're being taken great advantage of at our most vulnerable time.