The blog spheres have been going crazy with talk in the past 48 hours with the recent DOJ decision that allows online brokerages to have much more freedoms having access to listing databases. After a day and a half of thinking about it…I figured I would weigh in on online brokerages. Unfortunately, I don’t have the most popular opinion among many of the “traditional real estate” agents so may take some flack in the future for this post…but here goes…

As a full service real estate agent…I don’t understand why we would want to stifle a service that actually helps the consumer. Yes, an online brokerage will provide strong competition to the traditional agents like myself who find our business models challenged greatly. However, it is impossible to deny that real estate is changing. Our industry has always been slow to allow change for fear that it will threaten our livelihood. It is good to see this opportunity for change happening now.

As a full service agent, this encourages us to make sure that we are attaching even more value to our full service packages. We must now prove to the consumer that we are worth paying a few extra bucks to use during the most important transaction of their lives. I used to believe in the motto that “you get what you pay for”…honestly, in real estate not all agents make this statement true.

With the slowing market and the increase in discounted competition, I hope that many of these agents will get weeded out soon. Only the agents who show true value and talents should survive as a full service Realtor. I do believe that the business model of a full service agent is worth the extra cost…however, I think that we as agents have a hard time proving this to consumers many times.

I believe that online brokers offer a good package for the price…however, in sales…the best price doesn’t always mean it is the best deal for the consumer. It is now more important than ever that we as Realtors step up and show the true value in what we provide. Only the Realtors who do this will survive in the coming years.

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!


This entry was posted on Thursday, May 29th, 2008 at 2:43 pm and is filed under Real Estate Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.