If you work as an agent in real estate, most of you get paid by commissions earned and you do not receive a salary from your Broker.
You normally contract for services with a client and if you perform that service, the client pays the Broker a fee. Then you get paid from that fee according to the signed independent contractor agreement you have with your Broker. However, many of you fail to get a compensation contract from the clients!
I understand that MOST of you get a listing from the sellers for real estate that they want to sell—BUT, do you get a listing from buyers for your services?
You see, there are 2 things that you should get listed. A SELLER AND A BUYER! They are both buying your services and you need an agreement to get payment to the Broker in both cases.
Oh, wait a minute—you say you do not need a BBA? (buyer broker agreement) because the listing agent will pay you?
Have you never run into this scenario?
You make contact with a prospect and do several hours of research for them, emailing them what they need. . Somewhere in this process, you find out that they need to borrow money to buy a property and you spend time to get a lender to qualify them, sometimes with dismaying results. But let’s assume that they do qualify but have not found a house. Eventually, you will meet them at many properties on many different days OR actually drive them around in your car—AFTER YOU FILL UP WITH GAS. Their reaction is, let’s see the next one because it might be better and cheaper. Then they look at a nice website on the internet and respond to it. A new agent gets the call, they want the house and they do the deal—WITHOUT YOU! Your pay for this is zero because the listing agent did not pay you--and instead paid a different agent. WOW—how did that happen?
Let’s compare—if you take a listing on a house, then you get paid when it sells. Nice!
If you take a listing on a buyer prospect binding them to use your services the same as a listing on a house, then you get paid when they buy.
SO—go to zip forms and get a BUYER-BROKER EXCLUSIVE EMPLOYMENT AGREEMENT and become familiar with out. My advice is to get a retainer fee for your services, in advance. Be specific about line 28 and don’t use terms such as “3%”. (3% of what?) Line 32 needs to be used and then, in some cases, I would strike through the last phrase of line 34 and get it initialed by the buyers. This preserves the time agreed to in line 32.
Someday, when the NAR, that we are forced to belong to, steps out of the Stone Age, we will actually list our buyers and their needs in the MLS.
Then they could get rid of that STUPID procuring cause crap when agents start listing ALL buyers that want our services.
BEGIN—THE REST IS EASY
Bob Stephens CRB e-PRO
Managing Broker
West USA Realty
602-942-4200
