At Unique Homes Media, Inc. we aim to stay apprised of the latest trends and developments in luxury real estate. Today, we are excited to share insights from Allan Dalton, the former CEO of Realtor.com and now a published author. His new book, “Buyer Agent Be Aware: What Every Buyer Agent Must Know & Do in a Post-Disrupted Real Estate World,” offers valuable guidance for buyer agents navigating the evolving real estate landscape.
Luxury Buyer Agents Must Be More than a Luxury
According to the Oxford Dictionary, the word BUY is defined as “in exchange for payment” or “to accept the truth of something.” Commencing August 17th and in a post-disrupted real estate world, luxury real estate buyers will have to resolve both definitions of the term… Buy. Specifically, luxury real estate buyers will be forced to contemplate whether a buyer agent is essential, and what should be the negotiated compensation paid to the buyer agent.
Does anyone really expect the world’s most affluent shoppers, simply because they value vaguely defined “white glove service” and professional panache, will automatically accept paying tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars for a luxury buyer agent, merely because such agents are self-defined as luxury agents? Or is it more probable that luxury buyers, like all buyers, will become more deliberative and demanding while assessing exactly why and how much they are to pay directly to their luxury buyer agent?
Buyer agents when negotiating fees with prospective buyer clients, and perhaps for the first time will have to respond to new challenges to their purported buyer agent value. For example, when a prospective buyer client asks: “Why do I have to pay ten times as much in fees if I buy a five-million-dollar home than a five-hundred-thousand-dollar home?,” will all buyer agents be prepared to intelligently and convincingly respond to such buyer side value questions and challenges? Moreover, will luxury buyers become as accepting of negotiated fees, as luxury home sellers have been for decades, especially considering the evolution of luxury marketing? For example, it is clear that the advancement of luxury marketing in the form of upscale brands, divisions, marketing plans, elegant language, sophisticated staging, and exquisite marketing materials appear to be exponentially more remarkable and possess more refined infrastructural systems than the individual workings or merits of the solitary “luxury buyer agent.”
"How many luxury marketing agents have described an estate’s view as “views and vistas that even Ernest Hemingway could not adequately describe” or other “unique homes” caliber prose?"
I ask, how much more time has been devoted within the luxury real estate realm regarding “My luxury marketing plan” versus “My luxury buyer plan?” How much more specificity has been devoted to how luxury property is presented to the market by a luxury marketing agent than how a property is shown by a luxury buyer agent to luxury buyers? For example, how many luxury marketing agents have described an estate’s view as “Views and vistas that even Ernest Hemingway could not adequately describe” or other “Unique Homes” caliber prose? Conversely, a buyer agent when showing the same property, is more likely to underwhelmingly and generically comment “What a beautiful view.” I have heard many so-called luxury buyer agents describe ALL “Unique Homes,” regardless of how distinct or transcendent they are from each other, with suspiciously similar and repetitive terminology. Perhaps you too have heard some of these trite adjectives that are being used by your limited-vocabulary competitors… “Your home is
beautiful, charming, gracious, spacious, and elegant.”
Unlike these pedestrian property descriptions, (which are also routinely used by pizza deliverers seeking higher tips), world-class marketing luxury agents, painstakingly with or without chatGPT, treat each of their vaunted properties as though they were describing works of art being honored at the Louvre. Although less mature in their level of preparation within the industry, ironically buyer agent value presentations will actually need to rapidly become superior to so-called listing presentations.
This is because home sellers for fifty years or more have met so-called listing agents with universal expectations. Specifically, they would be agreeing to a negotiated fee, in advance of the home marketing process. These favorable expectations are not equally “embedded or accepted” in advance of buyer-client to buyer-agent presentations.
I say so-called “listing agents” as in my view, unless the real estate industry completely and forever purges the value-killing term “listing agent,” in favor of “seller agent,” then this calcified and non-representational sounding cliche will undermine the value of buyer agents. It will do so as it will deprive real estate transactions of critical representational symmetry. The term “listing agent” sounds too welcoming to buyers and comes across as non-oppositional. Regrettably, this outdated legacy term continues to be observed in a widespread fashion. Unfortunately, this value-undermining term exists at a time when more buyers than ever post August 17th, will be considering going directly to the very “helpful” listing agent. There could not be a more inviting term to entice buyers to bypass buyer agents than the words “listing agent.” The word listing agent suggests that they are prepared to help the buyer in the same way as the car salesperson is prepared to help a car buyer, even though they are representing the dealership. The weakening of buyer agent value will only lead to the weakening of “listing agent” value.
Regarding the need to convey immediately appreciated and irreplaceable value, which I believe luxury buyer agents provide, I respectively invite you to examine the book Buyer Agent Be Aware. Within this 28-module buyer agent one-of-a-kind resource, there is also a masterful and convincing method of presenting buyer agent value to prospective buyer clients. Also included are case studies of agents who individually produce 150 to 250 million dollars in sales volume in luxury markets each year, with 50% of their value coming from the buying side.
Although the common refrain amongst many top producers for years has been “listings are the name of the game,” and “if you don’t list you don’t last,” a case can be made that buyer agents may very well have more value than seller agents. Knowledgeable, real estate trusted advising buyer agents not only must develop prospecting, lead gen, CRM, and social media strategies, as do seller agents but also must possess an even deeper knowledge of neighborhoods, homes on and off the market, local schools, services and must go beyond the staging expertise of the seller agent and provide merchandising advice to their buyer that they might maximize their investment after acquisition. Moreover, they also must be skillful at negotiating, networking, and acting as an emotional buffer throughout the stress of transactions. During the transaction, they have greater responsibility and value in terms of facilitating the mortgage, title, insurance, inspection, and either escrow or attorney services. And of course, there is no comparison regarding after-the-sale value between a seller agent and a buyer agent. Luxury buyer agents should never be viewed as a “luxury”… but rather as essential… because you are!
Thank you for your kind attention.
Allan Dalton
“Marketing Real Estate At The Highest Level”