You Need a Real Estate Agent

Looking for a new house? In the past when it was time to move there were only a few options when it came to finding your new home. There were the local print ad books that you could pick up for free out front of the grocery store, you could drive around new neighborhoods for hours looking for “for sale” signs or you could find a real estate agent that had access to the MLS for that area. Frequently you might do all three. Now with websites like Zillow.com, Trulia.com and Realtor.com, finding homes that fit your criteria is easy.

The next step is pretty simple and obvious, just contact the real estate agent that has that property up for sale right? This happens a lot now. After hours of searching online, the listing agent gets a call that you are interested in this property and you would like to see it. Seems simple enough. Doing this will cut down on the back and forth that would happen if you had your own agent and it will cut out some of the commission right?

What a lot of people don’t know is that the real estate agent who listed the property on the MLS has a contractual agreement to work for the sellers. This means everything they do is going to be for the sellers best interest. When you contact the listing agent directly they will have you sign a waiver of dual agency but with this you do not get the full representation you would get if you had your own agent. This can have a big impact on negotiations when it comes time to writing and accepting your offer, negotiations on repairs and consequences if the deal falls through.

In West Virginia counties like Putnam county and Kanawha county there aren’t a lot of real estate agents but there are enough that if you are looking for a new home you should be able to have your own real estate agent to help you find properties you would be interested in, have the show you these homes and have the help you through the transaction from beginning to end.

An excellent real estate agent in the Kanawha and Putnam area is Heather Davis. She comes from a medical sales background that was extremely demanding and stressful. As a real estate agent Heather Davis is devoted to her clients unlike any I have ever met.

You can find her at Old Colony or follow her on Facebook