Three Reasons to Interview More than One Agent

Thinking it's time to put your house on the market?  One thing you owe yourself is to interview more than one agent. There are three reasons for this:

1. Just because an agent may have worked to successfully help you find your home, doesn't mean they are automatically awesome marketers who will be the best person to sell your home.
2. The only way to know if an agent's plan is the best strategy out there is to talk to various agents and see how they operate. Some agents don't have a plan.
3. Talking to more than one agent raises the bar for the agent you ultimately choose. Expect the agent you are hiring to dig deep, open up their toolbox, and get to work.

Sometimes agents get complacent. We think we have a listing in the bag, and we don't feel we need to sell you on our services. An agent should never take a listing for granted, and we should never assume you aren't shopping for the best agent.

It's a business decision.

Don't ever feel badly about interviewing multiple agents -- even if someone initially seems an obvious choice to you. It's your home, not the agent's, and you need to do your due diligence to find the hardest working agent to represent you. How many agents should you interview? Three is a good number.  

Now that you've made the decision to interview multiple agents, what are you supposed to even ask them? Here are some of the most important questions to ask any agent you are considering for the sale of your home:

1. What is your experience and familiarity with this town? In this price range?
2. What will you do to help me prepare my home for sale?
3. Can you tell me about the role of pictures? This is a hugely important aspect of marketing a home.
4. What marketing activities will be done on my home's behalf? Ask for examples.
5. Who will be my primary point of contact?
6. How do you go about conducting open houses?
7. What is the appropriate price point at which to list my home?
8. What are your strengths as an agent?
9. What kind of negotiator are you? Ask for examples.
10. What sets you apart from other agents?

Don't let the agent give you yes/no answers. Ask for specific examples. Go ahead and ask for testimonials. Even if you know the agent personally, you may not know how well they market houses. Get feedback from people who have used their services recently.

The kind of information an agent volunteers should illustrate how they envision describing your home to sound appealing, how they will portray your home through pictures and words, the vehicles they will use to market your home to get maximum exposure and how they will keep you updated on progress.

I once went into a listing presentation where the homeowner was certain she was going to use another agent, the agent she used to buy her home. Only the other agent didn't provide any examples at all as to what she was going to do for them. I received the listing because I showed how hard I was going to work for them.

All agents are not equal, by a long shot. Talk to multiple agents, see who you feel is the best fit for you and your home and ask these questions to determine who can deliver the goods.