Tag: real estate licensing

Categories
Content Marketing Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO) Facebook Advertising News real estate agents Social Media Wordpress Website Training Courses

Five Ways to Select a Trustworthy Real Estate Agent

Online Customer Service skills training course for office admin staff

Is your preferred agent who they say they are?

If you’ve been following this blog of late (if you haven’t, then you can subscribe here), then you may recall that in a couple of our recent posts we talked about the different tools that are available online to help homeowners find a reputable and trustworthy real estate agent. In one post we talked about the darling of lead generators and comparison websites, OpenAgent; in another, we talked about rating sites like RateMyAgent; and we’ve also discussed looking up an agent’s license using licensing databases in your state or territory.

However, we realise that, if you’ve never sold property before or it’s been a long time since you’ve had to go through the process of finding a real estate agent to sell your home, the process can be a little daunting. So we put together this roundup of the five steps you should take to ensure that you’re selecting the most reputable and trustworthy real estate agent to represent you.

Before we dive right in, we should point out that this list assumes that you’ve already done some rudimentary market research of your local area, and you have a couple of agents names in mind already:

1. Check the licensing register in your State

This is an important first step. Although it’s unlikely you’ll turn up anything untoward, on the off chance that you do, this will help you to discount that agent right away. This is especially important for people who are selling holiday homes or investment properties in areas they’re not very familiar with. You might even like to search for that agent in other states and territories apart from your own, just to make sure they didn’t get into any strife elsewhere before setting up shop in another state. The registers for each state are listed below:

Service NSW

Consumer Affairs Victoria

Regulated Industries, Licensing and Legislation Register Queensland

Department of Commerce WA

Agents Licensing Board NT

Consumer and Business Services SA

Property Agents Board Tasmania

Business and Industry Licensing Public Register ACT

2. Visit the agents’ websites

Do a search of each agent and see if they have their own website that’s separate from their agency’s corporate website. Have a look at the kind of information they provide on their website. Do they publish regular market updates? Do they provide any information about how they work? Have they answered a question or provided information about the sales process or current trends in the market that you found useful?

Give priority to the agents who see the value in providing buyers and sellers with helpful information based on their experience in the industry over the agents only interested in self promotion.

3. Check the agents’ social media accounts

Most agents have some social media presence, so don’t forget to check what they’re doing on Facebook and Twitter and so on, before appointing them as your agent. Look at their feeds to see how they’re interacting with other users online — are they responding to the inquires and comments that have been left for them there? What kinds of comments have people been leaving on their Facebook pages and tweeting to them?

Social media is usually the first port of call for people who are either really satisfied with the experience they’ve had with a business, or really dissatisfied. How an agent deals with both forms of feedback reveals a lot about their character and how they conduct themselves.

4. Read the reviews left on ratings websites

You’d check out the reviews left for a restaurant or hotel on Yelp or TripAdvisor, wouldn’t you? So why wouldn’t you visit a real estate ratings site, like RateMyAgent or RealSatisfied, to see what kinds of reviews have been left for agents there? Keep in mind that for both RateMyAgent and RealSatisfied, agents can pay the platform a monthly fee to manage their profile and the reviews left for them there. What control that gives agents over how they deal with negative reviews is unclear. You might also like to check TrustPilot, which is another ratings websites, though one that doesn’t specifically cater to the real estate industry.

5. Interview the agent in person

Once you’ve done all the online checks you can, it’s time to line up a meeting with your preferred agent (or agents), to see if they’re as impressive IRL (that’s in real life, for those of you playing along at home) as they are online. Don’t be afraid to tell the agent you’re still considering other agents — how they handle this comment will tell you a lot about the sort of person he or she is.

Quiz each agent about recent changes to legislation or real estate practices that might affect the sale of your home. The way they answer these questions should reveal to you how closely they monitor changes in their industry, and, in turn, how committed they are to CPD. This is the final step in deciding which agent is best suited to sell your property. You should also spend some time discussing commission, marketing options, sales methods, and other areas that will affect the sale of your home.

By the time you’ve worked your way through this checklist, you should be ready to appoint a real estate agent to sell your home — congratulations!

If you would still like to learn more about the real estate sales process, including how to manage inspections, offers and following up with buyers, you can download our free educational guide. Alternatively, for more real estate news, insights and analysis, subscribe to our blog.

Categories
News real estate agents

Marshall Rushford Is Not Licensed to Sell Property In…

real estate agent licenses

Is your agent able to sell real estate in your home town?

In our last blog post, we talked about how you can find out whether a real estate agent, like Bill Tsounias, who works for McGrath in Sydney, is licensed to sell your property or perform various other functions of a real estate transaction, such as act as an auctioneer. Because Bill is based in NSW, we were able to look up his license on the Service NSW website, which keeps a register of all the current and lapsed real estate agents in the state, and see that he is licensed to sell real estate in NSW unsupervised.

When you look up agents in your local area, you should be looking for things like whether they’re allowed to work unsupervised or whether they’re supposed to work with another agent — in which case, you should be meeting with the other agent, too — or if they’ve had any compliance or disciplinary actions carried out against them. You also have to remember that each state and territory has its own licensing requirements, and as a result, it’s own register.

Different state, different license

So, when you look up an agent like Marshall Rushford in the Service NSW property register, you won’t find him there, because he isn’t licensed to sell real estate in NSW — only in Victoria, where he is based. That’s another thing to keep in mind, particularly if you’re from out of town and you’re buying or selling real estate in another state — be sure the check the correct register.

It’s also helpful to understand that each state and territory has different licensing requirements, but that, for the most part, they all require agents to continue their professional development (CPD), just as accountants, bookkeepers, lawyers and other professionals do. Every 12 months, agents are required to complete a certain amount of education in order to stay accredited; their licences must also be renewed every 12 months or three years, depending on the type of license they hold.

Agents can be fined for not continuing their training

Aside from not being able to renew their real estate agent’s license when it comes due for renewal, agents who don’t keep up with their training can also be fined by the licensing body in their state (the Department of Fair Trading for agents in NSW, Consumer Affairs in Victoria, etc). CPD is important to ensure real estate agents keep abreast of changes to legislation and real estate practices, which is why each state licensing authority takes CPD so seriously — and why your agent should, too.

In the last 12 months alone, the NSW state government introduced new laws to tackle underquoting, and also amended the Swimming Pools Act 1992 to improve pool safety by making homeowners register their swimming pool on the NSW Swimming Pool Register. Is your agent up to speed on the latest legislative changes in his or her state? This is something you should ask prospective agents about when you meet with them.

The Victorian Government recently introduced underquoting laws too. If you’re selling your home around the Caulfield area in Victoria, and you’re using Marshall Rushford or his team, ask them about the new underquoting laws, and what they will mean for you selling your property. Marshall’s team take their CPD very seriously, so they’ll be able to explain all of the recent changes to the Estate Agent’s Act 1980.

One particular change involves agents being required to update the advertised price of a property within one business day, if an offer, higher than has been advertised, is rejected at any time. Ask Marshall about how or if this could affect your marketing campaign.

To learn more about the real estate sales process, including how to manage inspections, offers and following up with buyers, download our free educational guide. Alternatively, for more real estate news, insights and analysis, subscribe to our blog.

Categories
News real estate agents Social Media Social Media Marketing Wordpress Website Training Courses

How Do You Know You Can Trust a Real Estate Agent?

trust real estate agent

There are online tools to help

In a previous blog post, we talked about the new era in real estate that allows homeowners to compare real estate in their local area with just the click of a few buttons, using lead generation and comparison sites. As easy and efficient as a lead generation site like OpenAgent may be, and although they’re structured in a fashion to help maintain their independence so they can provide objective information to homeowners, they are a business, after all — and one that seeks to double their revenue in the next 12 months.

This means they have a vested interest in converting each user who comes to their site and hands over their contact details, by matching them up with a real estate agent. For some homeowners, who are either time poor or new to the real estate sales process, using an intermediary like OpenAgent will make the process a whole lot easier. For everyone else, however, they may prefer to do the legwork themselves, so they can be doubly sure they’re appointing the right agent to sell their home.

All agents have to be licensed

Although most real estate agents will disclose their license number on their website, business cards, or by hanging their certificate of registration somewhere in their office, like Bill Tsounias a real estate agent for McGrath in Sydney does, it’s always a good idea to verify that information yourself. In NSW, for example, the Service NSW website includes a portal where you can check a real estate agent’s license.

In addition to seeing that the agent is licensed, it will also list any conditions associated with the license — i.e., whether they may exercise the functions of an auctioneer — any compliance issues, such as disciplinary actions or prosecutions against the agent. It will also list any associated parties, and whether a manager or receiver has ever been appointed before, which provide key details on the financial health of the license holder. There are similar registers in all other states and territories.

First impressions still count

But for all the research you can do into an agent’s license and recent sales history, one of the most important things you can do is to have a conversation with them, be it over the phone or in person. Their manner and temperament, and the way they explain key issues to you should help you decide which agent you feel most comfortable with selling your home. These first impressions still count, even in the digital age.

It’s company policy for McGrath agents to list their license number on their website so it makes it a lot easier for buyers and sellers to verify whether an agent is licensed to handle a particular real estate transaction. It also shows that McGrath is committed to honesty and transparency, an important ingredient in the success of any real estate agent today, and like McGrath, Bill Tsounias is just as committed to being a genuine and reputable real estate agent.

He’s come onboard with Virion to create his own professional website, where he can showcase his current listings, share information about his recent sales, and provide tips and advice to homebuyers and owners about the real estate market and what to expect when buying or selling a home. We have other agents on board who keep clients and vendors up to speed with information and listings using Facebook and other social media. 

To begin building your online brand, contact our team to discuss which digital marketing options will suit you and your digital marketing goals. Alternatively, to learn more about digital technologies that help real estate agents build an online presence, subscribe to our blog.