Tina Hughes

You have touched on several different items here.

1. If you try to sell your property strictly By Owner, you are limiting your property's exposure to agents tremendously. They won't have access to your property through their local MLS and will only show your property if it is in their target market or they have a buyer looking in your specific neighborhood. An agent will contact you prior to showing your home to their buyer to negotiate the commission rate you are willing to pay them if they sell your property. Bottom line, you will have a very limited number of agents viewing your home, much less bringing you offers, if you don't have it listed in their local MLS.

2. There are Brokers providing ala carte services with a flat fee business model where you pay up front for the services provided. There are great differences in the prices and services provided among companies and is recommended you do some homework to make sure the selected Broker has experience with this business model and provides the services required to sell your property in today's market, i.e. MLS, virtual tours, website presence, contract forms, lockbox (easy agent access), etc. It will be up to you as the Seller to make yourself available via phone and email so buyers and agents alike can communicate with you.

Secondly, you should be willing to pay the selling agent a standard commission, if not higher. In today's market, with so much inventory, commission advertised can definitely make a difference in your home being shown. You will shortcut the number of showings by agents (who have the serious buyers) if you are not willing to pay them.

3. I will be happy to explain the flat fee business model with you in more detail and the advantages of using a nationally known branded company. - Wed May 20 2009, 14:52