They were very rarely available to show us homes and instead just gave us the lock box codes to we could walk through on our own.
It was also suspicious they felt the need to justify their existence saying the hard part is drawing up the contracts. But as far as we could tell the loan company did all that work. The realtor just showed up to the signing and let the loan officers answer any questions we had.
Sure, most transactions are not as fast and easy for them but it seems with these numbers if they are with one client for 2 weeks straight and sell a house at the end they are still way ahead. Even if they sell 1 house a month at that rate it's still a killing.
I take it this is your first transaction buying a house. You are basing what you think on that and what people are saying online. I can assure you as someone that buys real estate (as investments) it typically isn't that easy, at least in a typical market and for most transactions. And I have been doing this since the 1980's fwiw.
I do believe it is sometimes more complicated. But is the value of a realtor's time to me, as a buyer or seller, really several hundred dollars per hour? Is buying a 600k house really twice as difficult a transaction than a 300k house? Why are they not paid a flat fee?
> Why buyer's agents are paid on sale-price-commission is
Once again buyer's agents are a large part of the equation. They have to drive around the actual buyers and waste time showing properties with nothing to show for it often.
So the way it works is the people who actually buy (or sell) make more money to compensate for people that do not buy.
But a sales price commission, of all possible completion-based pay structures, makes the interest of the agent misaligned with (opposed to, in some respect) that of the principal.
Have you read Freakanomics? They find that agents are more interested in closing add getting paid rather than the extra couple hundred dollars of commission a $10000 swing in price gets them. I'd gladly fight to save a buyer I represent $10000 on price even if it "costs" me $200-$300 of less commission.
It was also suspicious they felt the need to justify their existence saying the hard part is drawing up the contracts. But as far as we could tell the loan company did all that work. The realtor just showed up to the signing and let the loan officers answer any questions we had.
Sure, most transactions are not as fast and easy for them but it seems with these numbers if they are with one client for 2 weeks straight and sell a house at the end they are still way ahead. Even if they sell 1 house a month at that rate it's still a killing.