HOW SELLERS TURN LOCAL AGENTS INTO ENEMIES
by Neil JenmanReading time: apx 2 minsHarry and Muriel want to sell their home. Their children have grown and flown so they want to downsize. Plus create extra cash.Before he…
By Neil Jenman
Years ago, we fell victim to a simple scam. A fake email was sent to our accounts department asking for an invoice to be paid. Our accounts manager obediently transferred the requested sum: ten thousand dollars.
Later, he said he knew we liked to pay our bills on time.
Yes, but real bills, not fake bills. We assumed you’d check first.
If this happened to you, would you be upset?
Would you fume?
Would you be filled with rage and distress?
Although we got the money back, I never forgot the experience of losing ten thousand dollars so easily and quickly.
Nor have I forgotten how Westpac hit us with a fee for depositing the money back in our account. Thieves all around. It’s awful.
Is there anything worse in our financial lives than losing money we shouldn’t lose?
Yes, one thing: Losing money and not knowing we’ve lost it. And it happens repeatedly.
Which is exactly what is happening to most home-sellers. They lose money without realising it. A lot of money. Every time they sell.
Aside from thousands of dollars in needless costs – such as advertising, most home-sellers also lose tens of thousands of dollars by having their homes short-sold.
It’s like getting over-charged and short-changed at the shops.
Only thousands of times worse.
Actually, it’s probably more like moving out of your home and leaving a suitcase full of cash in the lounge room.
Although most agents dislike it being revealed (because it exposes their incredible incompetence), the research is now unequivocal: Most home-sellers get short-sold, often by massive amounts, sometimes by millions of dollars.
Yes, that’s right, it happens all the time.
One case that sticks in my mind is an elderly couple who sold their home for $11 million. The buyer was willing to pay $15 million.
The sellers missed out on $4 million; and for one reason: their agent was incompetent. He recommended public auction which is commonly what foolish or incompetent agents suggest.
Please, no matter what you do: Never sell your home by public auction. Auction is the way sellers are almost guaranteed to short-sell their homes. And most never realise it.
To be short-sold means that a home SELLS FOR LESS THAN IT SHOULD HAVE SOLD.
It means either higher-paying buyers could have been found or, alternatively, the ‘successful’ buyers would have paid more than they did pay. Usually a lot more.
Most homes are short-sold. Collectively, across Australia, sellers are losing hundreds of millions of dollars a week. The reason is always the same: Agents are either incompetent or apathetic. They don’t care about getting the highest price, they just care about commission. Please understand a vital point with real estate agents: Whether sellers get the highest price or not, agents always get a high commission.
Go on, try something.
If you’re selling your home and the agent is asking you to lower your price, ask them to lower their commission. See how they like it.
The amount by which homes are short-sold is, on average, about 10 per cent. If a home sells for $800,000, the odds are 80 per cent that it has been short-sold by at least $80,000.
If you own an average home in an average city, it’s probably worth at least $800,000.
Now, think about something else: Depending on the agent you choose and how you sell your home, the difference in your pocket can easily be eighty thousand dollars, often even more.
What does $80,000 mean to you?
What could you do if you had $80,000 more right now?
How long does it take you to earn $80,000 – six months? A year? Longer?
Okay, well try this one: How long does it take you to save $80,000?
Whatever your answer, it will take you a lot longer to save $80,000 than to figure out how to get $80,000 extra when you sell your home.
Imagine if someone offered you a job. One week’s work for $80,000. Would you take the job?
Almost certainly you’d say yes. Most people wouldn’t even ask what the job entailed. They’d just take it. From sweeping the streets to cleaning sewers – a week for $80,000 is a deal most people would snap up.
Well, how about a pleasant job?
How about if you were paid $80,000 to READ A BOOK?
That’s right, just one book. The book is about 400 pages. So, at an average reading speed of a page a minute, that’s 400 minutes, about 6.5 hours.
Plus revision. You see, as well as reading the book, you need to understand it. As Dr Phil says: “There are two types of people – those who get it and those who don’t get it. Be one of the ones who get it.”
When it comes to selling your home, you need to know how to get an extra $80,000 for it. You need to understand how easy it is to get the highest market price.
You don’t need to put in as much work trying to sell it as you did trying to buy it. Not even close. But you must put in some work. Unless you enjoy losing money.
When selling their home most sellers just call an agent, believe what the agent tells them and then sign-up with the agent. That’s NOT the way to get the highest price. It’s the way to almost certainly get short-sold.
Soon, sellers are being pressured to accept a lower price as the agent gives them “market feedback”. It would be more accurate to say the sellers are being fed to sharks who are feeding on them. And enjoying every dollar they bite off the price.
It’s a national outrage. Most homes are short-sold. And many by an average of $80,000.
Many sellers could get at least another $80,000 for their home. If only they would make the time (about 6.5 hours plus a bit extra to ‘get’ the points) to discover the secrets most agents never tell them. That’s because most agents either don’t know how to get sellers the highest price or they don’t care.
If it’s your home, you should care.
Come on: You worked so hard to buy your home, do a bit of work to get the best price when you sell it.
Read a book that tells you how to get at least $80,000 more for your home. It’ll take you less than eight hours.
That means you’re effectively being paid $10,000 an hour.
The book is called ‘Don’t Sign Anything! – How to Protect Yourself from the Tricks and Traps of Real Estate’. I wrote it years ago. It has helped thousands of people, many of whom have told me how much extra they have got for their homes.
This week, I spoke with a lady who read my book. Using the suggestions in the book, the price keeps climbing. It’s the opposite to what’s happening to most sellers now. She said: “Without your support, we’d have sold for a million dollars less.”
Last Friday, we helped some owners sell their home for $600,000 more than agents were telling them they might have to accept.
So no, it’s not always $80,000 more that you’ll get.
When you know what you’re doing, you might get $600,000 more. You might get a million dollars more. Or, like the owners who sold for $11 million, you might get $4 million more.
It’s heartbreaking to see what’s happening to thousands of sellers every week.
If you are a genuine home-seller (not an agent) and you really want to sell for the highest price, I will send you a copy of my book with my compliments. Today. No obligation, of course. And no pressure. Or, if you’ve already got the book, call me on 1800 1800 18 and I’ll give you the updates, most of which are going in future editions I am writing now. But don’t wait, get the right information today. And no, I will never sting you for money. Not a cent.
That’s true. I seriously want to help you.
So, to find out how to get at least $80,000 extra for your home, just call our office anytime on 1800 1800 18 or send your details to us at [email protected].
It’s your home. You worked hard to buy it. Make sure you don’t short-sell it.
Get the highest price when you sell. It’s easy once you know how to do it.
Indeed, it’ll probably be the easiest $80,000 you ever earn.
Oh – if you’re wondering what happened to the accounts manager who fell for the fake email and transferred ten thousand dollars out of our account, he’s no longer with us. We replaced him with a smart and delightful lady.
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PLEASE NOTE: Our focus is upon helping consumers. Abuse from agents on our web site or Facebook page will be deleted, ignored or well publicised – it depends on our mood.
But one thing will never vary: We will never stop doing what we love most – helping polite and honest consumers get the best deal possible in real estate. And, of course, if any agents are serious about taking care of consumers, we’ll help you too. Thank you.
