After being buried in 18 inches of snow, and spending waaaay to much time watching FIOS On Demand TV, I had one of those nights where I stayed awake thinking of random things. Last night I was wondering how many people there are per Realtor in Virginia. There are so many times when I tell people I'm a Realtor and they reply, "So am I". But they say that when their sitting across from me as a customer service rep at a bank, or helping me in a store. They may have their license, but it clearly isn't their every-week, this-is-how-I-pay-more-mortgage profession.
I searched statistics on the Bureau of Labor and Statistics, the Census Bureau, and Wikipedia. I took the number of Real Estate Sales Agents and Broker, divided by the population of Virginia, and found there are 635 people for every Realtor. 16.3% of every person over 16 in Virginia moved in 2006. 68.9% of Americans were homeowners in 2005, and the average household size in 2000 was 2.59 people. That gave me an estimate of the count of Virginia households who are homeowners who moved. Divide that by the count of Real Estate Agents and Brokers and there are 28 Virginia households moving each year for every Realtor. That sounds about right.
As intimidating as it is for me to think about competing to find my theoretical 28 households that are moving each year, it should be way more intimidating for the householder that is moving that doesn't know the business reputation of a Realtor. To simply choose someone because they are your sister-in-law, cousin, or the lady that teaches Sunday school at your church is really scary.
What should you look for in a Realtor? It's best to find someone with local knowledge of the area where you need to sell or want to buy. Experience is super important. It isn't how long they've been in the business but rather how many transactions they are handling a year. If someone does this as a hobby it's impossible for them to keep up with all the movement that happens every single month in the market place, changes within the standardized contracts, and the lending and legal developments.
Character counts. There are so many opportunities for someone to cut corners and fudge about what is said and done, and this can, at the least, lead to messing things up so that you don't get the house you want to buy or sell the house you need to sell. At the worst it can lead to expensive mistakes and even legal consequences.
Negotiation skills matter. Negotiating is not being a brow-beater, and pressing the other side until they feel abused. It only starts with getting to an agreement for the sales price. Negotiations continue through the many contingencies most contracts have that must be navigated on your way to the settlement table.
And that leads me to temperament. It's great to work with someone that has a sparkling personality, but what happens to that personality when the stress sets in? And it will. It's invaluable to work with someone who keeps a level-head when those about them are losing theirs. Someone who can sympathize with your emotions, but stays the steady course to come up with common-sense solutions to get you to your goal of buying or selling a home.
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