Estate Agents Commission

Maybe it's just me, but does it matter what the agent adds on to the price you ask for?  For eample if you ask for €100,000 and you get €100,000 what difference does it make if the agent adds on 1,3,5 or 10%?  You determine how much you want to receive.  In effect the buyer is paying the comission not the seller.

Or is that too simplistic?

The point is, in my experience, the way it happens with resale properties in the villages is this:

1, The vendor decides what they want for the property, lets say 100k (This is probably not an accurate value for the property but usually a a grossly inflated figure plucked out of the air by the vendor)

2. The vendor gives details of the property to a 'corredor', a local Mr Fixit character who acts as a middle man, He puts on his cut, say 20k.

3. The corredor then passes on the property details to an agent, or more likely several agents, mainly UK or English agents because it is only the Brits that are buying this type of property. They add on their 'commission' which could vary from 10k to 30k, sometimes more .

Thus you end up with a property that is marketed to the unsuspecting Brits at anything from 130k to 150k. As there is no control over the price, the same property can usually be found on different websites at different prices and it is usually pot luck as to which one you find first. Until you become wise to it, you do not think to search the web to see if you can find the same property at a lower price, which you usually can. The prices may appear cheap compared to what you can buy in the UK so people think the property is good value for money.

The vendor has no idea what the agents are adding on and doesn't really care as long as he gets his 100k, bearing in mind this is over the top in the first place. I have even known of deals where a buyer put in an offer at 10k under the (agents) asking price and the agent got the vendor to reduce his price by 10k and the agent simply left their 'commission' the same. Greedy or what!!

You might say that none of this matters and that a buyer will pay what they think the property is worth to them. My argument is that if they knew that there was potentially 40k or 50k on top of what the owners are asking most would not be happy to pay the price. There is no transparency and all of this is hidden from the buyer and in most cases from the vendor too. Most people are buying for the first time in a country and a legal system they are unfamiliar with, don't speak the language and most deals are done in cash with a proportion of 'black' money so the buyer is at a complete disadvantage from the very start. Not surprisingly they end up putting their trust in the agent who becomes their 'friend' and tells them everything is just fine...the very people who are ripping them off the most. In my view the whole thing stinks and the agents are the worst culprits. Oh and by the way, the agents recommended lawyer is in on the deal because he has to 'cream off' the agents cut without the vendor knowing.

This is why I think agents need to be regulated and commissions rates standardised. It needs to be transparent. This is why I think it matters.

That kind of attitude `sunny disposition` is EXACTLY why there are soooo many broken dreams and angry people who have been ripped off , I for one just hope I don`t ever get offered a place you are selling, if you treat all prospective buyers with such contempt!

Of couse it matters you silly girl , if I wanted to sell my home I WANT TO SELL IT , not have some grubby Coredor and Agent adding their inflated `cuts` which then probably put up the price so much that no one wants to even look at the wretched place!!

Where are you coming from ?! No doubt your a Brit more than happy to rip off others and watch it happening too, who needs friends like you dear ?!!

Roybud , you have hit the nail on the head!!

We have just heard our offer has been turned down , so we are going to write to the vendor in Spanish again repeating our offer and reasons for the lower than asking price , a lot of expense and work needed BEFORE its habitable , we have seen enough places to know roughly what a place is worth , we won`t lose sleep over not getting this house , its worth what its worth so it will probably remain empty and falling apart for another few years while it carries on depreciating , does the agent and coredor care, do they hell !!!

Will look again next year , the old saying, if its meant to be it will happen, the days of chasing a house are over , who needs all that hassle , if some one wants to sell then they will !

Thanks for the eye opening thread as that info will prove to everyone to be aware and NO ONE epascially agents are your friend !!

I can see there is a lot of anger against agents and I can understand why.

Let me just do a litlle adjustment to your complaints, the problem are not the agents , the problem is people who call themselves agents but all they do is show you around houses and the area.

A profesional agent, just as me:-) , will never list a house without doing a proper valuation, and without verifying all the legal aspects of the property even before signing whatever with the vendor.

Next step is to fix the price of the property, wich will always include a comition for the agent, that comition , in my case and so many other PROFESSIONALS, is justified by the marketing , publicity and personal effort we put on to sell the property, nobody is obliged to buy with an agent and nobody is obliged to sell with an agent, is just an option you have , you can try and fix your own car so why go to a mechanic to do it???

Cheers

Estate Agents in Spain spend a hell of a lot more time with clients and taking on property than UK Agents do......UK Agents are not expected to check legailty or deeds or anything, plus most clients do the visit themselves....no Agent present.......no driving, noi registering kids in school, no advice on relocation etc etc.............most Agents seem to end up as unpaid go fors..........there is no comparison at all in the amount of work done............and te legitimate ones have a minimum of 274 euros to pay out per person per month whether any income or not....I could go on but so often it ios the charlatans who give the real professional Agents a bad name and the profesional ones cannot exist on such low coomms as 1.5% as it is just not viable.  Everyone I know that has tried it lasted less than a year - you get the service you pay for and marketing and advertising etc are not cheap

Thanks MexMaya,

It´s about time that people respect the agent´s work a litle more!!

we have our apartmnet up for sale with a well known estate agent in

benimar for 82,000 euros.

they informed us that  the commission would be 2 - 3 % if anyone walked

in off the street. BUT if it was viewed by someone on many of their foreign

websites the charge would be 6,000 euros. consequently

we are taking it off the market with them when our contract expies in

january.

DAYLIGHT ROBBERY

Couldn´t agree more with you Gypsy, that is not the way a professional agency would work.

Cheers

If an agent sells your property and you get what you want, what is the problem?

I work for an agency,  and yes they charge 5%.

I don't think people realise how far agents have to travel in between properties showing people around, we recently covered 530km showing a couple around over 3 days. Please bear in mind that we only get payed when people buy!! (and they didn't)

Perhaps as a seller you would prefer agents to charge an hourly rate for the work they carry out plus advertising charges on each individual property. Some sellers  would get an awful shock particularily in cases where the listing lasts for months

Here Here!! I would love to be payed by the hour!

Cazzy

Why do you think these clients didnt buy from you

Rod

www.ournextholiday.co.uk

I can see many of the people around here are agents.

I am an agent also , so let me explain whta I think about comittions.

First of all I only list exclusive properties, I dont care if I only have 100 listings, I know I am going to sell them, but properties don´t sell on their own, you have to invest money before you get your earnings, I advertise in all the good and most visited web pages, newspapers, magazines, I release my own magazine, etc..., wich means that by the time I sell a property I have already spent lot´s of money, so this is what I give to my vendors in return for their trust.

I say all this to make a point , do you rather pay a low 2/3%  comition to an agent that all he does is put a sign on your window and hasn´t even got an office, or do you prefer to pay a 5/6% for somebody that actually does a good marketing and publicity of your property and that has a well positioned office in your area??

It all comes down to knowing what is your agent going to do after he lists your house, what kind of real estate service is he going to give you?

Also sometimes vendors tend to say "I want xxx for myself and you can put whatever your comittion is on top", and they do it with several agents, this is just gonna make your house not sell, because the vendor will put his add on the internet with a price and each agency will put his own price,would somebody buy a house like this?

Buying or selling a house is an important step in your lives , all you have to do is use common sense.

Kind Regards

I belive agents work hard for their money and understand they dont get paid unless there is a sale, nevertheless 5% which is what most of them charge is enourmous specially with the larger properties, but think about a property worth €500.000, that is a €25.000 comission plus 18% VAT! This is enormous and for the people who are desperate to sell to cover debts it makes it very difficult.  An average employee in Spain earns €12.000 a year so surely some comissions can be dropped a little!

When clients put an offer in the vendor is expected to reduce the price but estate agents will fight like no ones business not to reduce their comissions.

I belive in the current market that things need to be adapted to accordingly.

Vendors need agents and agents need vendors! Some are great and happy to compromise but the ones that dont are the ones causing the problems.

Joan

Normally agents do drop their comittion when a offer is made for a vendors house, at least I do that, it´s better to have 50% of something than 100% of nothing.

roliveira I am really glad to hear that and hope that others take example as people are very greedy at the moment and some are really not willing to do so.

Joan

We also drop our commisssion if an offer is made, most other agents that I know do!  A sale is better than no sale for all concerned.

When times were good no one seemed to complain much but things are different these days and all of the agents I know tend to drop their commission rates for higher valued properties.

A good estate agent friend of mine was telling me the other day that he spent a whole week with a client, showing him a ton of properties, buying him lunch and everything.  In the end he didn't buy as he didn't feel they were enough of a bargain for him, even though some of them truly were.

The amount of money my friend spent that week was hundreds, just on that one client and got nothing out of it.

It's a very frustrating business to be in at the moment and knowing how tough it is, even for the most honest of agents, I really don't begrudge them having to still require a 5% commission.

Even at this level most agents I know are struggling to survive.

Justin

More fool your friend I am afraid to say Justin. No one would get a lunch out of me until after they had bought! You can't expect people to buy just because you have driven them around a lot and taken them out for nice lunch. You need to do a lot of background work and make sure that the properties you are showing are what the client actually wants. Surely this guy must have known the prices before he decided to view so he could have told they weren't enough of a bargain for him. Probably a time waster admitedly but he could and should have been better managed so your friend didn't waste his time and money.

Also, all the agents on here have been getting very defensive about their hard earned commission, but they are missing the point. No one begrudges sales agents earning a reasonable commission for the work they do - 5% seems to be about the norm at the moment which seems fair and reasonable to me. The point that I and others have made here before is when an extortionate amount of 'commission' get added on top of the vendors price by certain agents. This is not declared to the buyer and the buyer ends up paying a much higher price than necessary as a result of greed by the agent concerned.

Hopefully this practice is on its way out. All we are asking for is fair and transparent system that is fair for all.