An Undecided Vendor
The first one; the red agent, was from the same company we chose last time. It wasn't the same chap as we dealt with before though; he was a charmer! This one was rather more serious, but knew his stuff. He had a report from Rightmove which showed lots of similar properties and stuff he’d sold before. I got the sense that he was claiming glory for sales that had little do with him and it was clear that he's more used to dealing with stuff on the northern side of the town. He said they are the market leader, but he seemed more concerned about discrediting his competitors than talking about the benefits of his own service. He also told me his wife gets involved in lots of charitable things and goes on Twitter a lot, but I don't quite see what that has to do with anything.
The second; the blue agent was clearly very passionate about what he does. He spent a lot of time talking about the feedback he'd had from other people moving (a lot of them with the red agent) and was keen to do things differently. He said that they don't advertise in the newspaper any more as it is a waste of money and means they don't have to charge as much. He was keen to stress that their approach is more consultative than red, but I got the sense that his pitch was rather too polished.
The third; the yellow agent was the most surprising. I hadn't really wanted to bother getting 3 of them round, but my therapist said that she'd used them and was very impressed. He's obviously been trying very hard to build his business to compete with the other two and has plans to open several new offices. He was at least able to give more direct answers to some of our questions. He did have some different ideas about marketing the place, but couldn't really show me where he'd done this sort of thing successfully in the past.
In essence, all three of them seem to offer relatively similar services and although there was a lot of detail in what they had to say, there wasn't anything tangible which would make me choose one over another. One thing the blue and yellow ones said is that I didn't need to worry about a HIP whereas the red one was very keen to point out the virtues of them. The way he went on you'd think he'd invented them. Perversely, I got the impression that the blue one was offering a better service in some areas for a lower fee, when I thought he would charge more considering he deals more at the top end. You should have seen the property he'd sold with the duck house and a moat! The yellow one, I was tempted by, but he said that we'd have to see his financial adviser too if we were to really appreciate the service that they provide.
The valuations they gave us were quite different and none of them could really give me a straight answer as to why their price was a realistic one, although they're all going to confirm it in writing.
I suppose it comes down to the credibility of the individual more than anything. Who should I trust to sell my most important asset? No doubt this will be a topic for further debate...
What a great article Daniel i'm sure it will get lots of comments.
I hole heartly belive that the best way to choose an agent to sell your property after meeting them at your property is to go with who you feel comfortable with. Call it Gut instinct!
All said & done trust, proof of genuine similar sales and desire to achieve your goal should be top on the list.
As you say all us agents seem to offer the same and we believe we are better than one another but the proof is in the pudding. The agent that has loads of sold boards with similar property is possibly the best choice.
You could always set them a challange, give them the one that you liked the most say exclusive to them for 2 weeks all agents love a challange :)
Posted by: Kevin Winchester | Friday, 16 April 2010 at 03:44 PM