When you hire a real estate broker, you expect and assume that your agent will have everything you need–all the real estate knowledge, experience, and professionalism to help you buy your home at the best possible price, the best terms, and that he or she will protect you all the way to closing. No doubt you expect that your agent will give you excellent guidance and accurate information, and you certainly assume that your agent will be absolutely loyal to you. We also expect our politicians to be honest, loyal, to place our interests above all else, to be experts in handling our money and managing government affairs. Hmm. The thing about real estate agents is that the values you want the most (honesty, competence, professionalism, loyalty) all flow out of real estate broker leadership. The culture of a brokerage flows from the leadership . . . every single time.
Real Estate Broker Leadership is Key
I was reminded of how important these qualities are when an agent from a brokerage from outside this local area demonstrated incredible incompetence, and killed a transaction for one of my agent’s buyers. I won’t go into detail here, but our buyer was shocked, and so were we. As the Designated Broker I called the other agent’s Designated Broker to walk through what her agent had been doing or not doing, but here’s what happened. Nothing. The rule for most brokerages is hang any real estate agent’s license on the wall. The real estate industry does not do a very good job policing it’s own. The Code of Ethics hasn’t saved consumers, and designated brokers rarely hold their agents to high standards. I could give many examples, but I won’t. Okay, that’s my rant for the week.
Last Updated on September 21, 2019 by Chuck Marunde
