Rude REA

W

wildfire

My partner and I are in the process of buying our first house together (his 2nd house) this will be the house that we live in whilst the other property in for investment.

I am having a rant about REA who are not that great at their job! I work night shift and so does my partner usually between 7pm - 7am for 7 days a fortnight which makes house hunting hard as we don't get up until around 2pm and this leaves only 3 good hours of looking at houses, talking, reading and everything else that goes into buying a house

I have spoken to about 8 REA in the area who are all looking for us, we basically have our finance sorted, chosen the area we like, saved the deposit (of $50k) in less then 6 months, and we are ready to seriously look at a house to buy.

Today I receive a call from a REA who is in the area, he calls 4 days after I go to his office, I left a detailed message of 'I am wanting details on this property can you get so-and-so to call for details" and I left it at that. This morning he calls and the conversation goes like this
Me hi 'company name'
He 'is allysha there'
Me 'Speaking'
He 'I got a call to call you back'
Me 'oh ok, in regards to'
He 'a property in _insert area here_'
Me 'great, which one are you referring to'
He 'I don't know you left the message'
Me 'that doesn't help, I have seen 25+ properties over the last month and asked about many more'
He 'well that doesn't help me'
Me 'We were looking in _insert new estate here_'
He 'I have houses in there but they are $380k - $400k' (he inflated the average house price in the estate by about $30k right here'
Me 'Great, can we come and look'
He 'I don't have time to take people through if they don't want to buy'
Me 'that's great dude, we have finance and a deposit ready to go, you just lost out of a sale I will go to the real estate across the road and they will sell another house in the estate, loose the attitude you could of sold a house today'
__ hang up __

I sort of spat it at the 'I don't have time to take people through if they don't want to buy' for all he knew I could of been anyone down the phone, he knew nothing of me or our position to buy and he is rude like that?? Gees dude, chill out, don't fear to 'waste' time and you might sell a house!!

What's with the sour attitudes of some REA these days?? Also the slack ones who get back to you a half a week after you come in with no idea why you called despite leaving a detailed message

Is the RE industry that busy that the agents are that busy or are they just lazy and pretentious! Mind you I work in an industry where you need to ask everyone for business who walks through the door to be a top sales person, and I do ask everyone who walks in and in return I am in the top 5 sales person in the establishment! Where did good old fashion service go?
 
wildfire said:
Me 'that doesn't help, I have seen 25+ properties over the last month and asked about many more'
He 'well that doesn't help me'

Where did good old fashion service go?
Click to expand...


I think that is a classic example of unaligned goals. The RE industry is a prime example of unaligned goals and self-interest amongst all 3 parties (Vendor / agent / Purchaser).


...or maybe the good ol' fashioned service went out the window when the quick 5 minute internet fly-over came to replace it.


In all honesty, are all 25+ houses that you've seen that different and all unsuitable. How exactly perfect does it have to be ??


N.B. : Houses all look the same to me. I'm not pernickety when it comes to that, but you may well be.
 
Dazz said:
In all honesty, are all 25+ houses that you've seen that different and all unsuitable. How exactly perfect does it have to be ??
.
Click to expand...


Not picky at all, comparing 5 areas between 20km from the CBD to 5km to the CBD comparing everything from age of house, size of house, size of block, future developments possibilities if any, bedroom numbers, bathroom numbers, quality of house, everything you should check when you are buying a house that you will be living in for the next 5 or so years prior to it becoming an IP. Comparing notes, other sales prices in the area, open houses, auctions - the lot! Comparing townhouses, units, flats, houses; both single and double story properties, vacant blocks, display homes for possible buying a block and building!

The number of houses I have looked at should be no indication as to how fussy I am, just how much thought I am putting into buying the house.

I am planning to look at at least another 25 then we will make our decision, and that will also be based on how trustworthy / professional that REA is, as this buying a house is a big purchase for me (as is most people) so I want to know that I am exploring all options

In all reality I asked him to email what properties he has available with his contact details and I would get back to him, it would take all but 5 - 10 minutes to draft an email and send it, I didn't ask him to take me through the houses or meet with him, but about the same time it takes to make a coffee and sit down he could of sold a house! I guess coming from a sales background where you must have the highest customer service possible I don't have time for rude / arrogant sales people! They simply wont get my business and considering most houses in that estate we were asking are multi listed I have now found out, looking at the houses that he has over priced on first contact I wont be doing any business with him! His loss not mine, I now know where I can see those houses!
 
In a hot market all they had to do was opon the front door, perhaps they have forgotten how to sell and service new customers, yknow work at it?
 
craigb said:
In a hot market all they had to do was opon the front door, perhaps they have forgotten how to sell and service new customers, yknow work at it?
Click to expand...

So basically fly by night agents who have no interest in the industry or care for their customers, they take business from all the long-term and reliable REA's piss clients off by snubbing them and then leaving the industry because they can't get any business, but burn their bridges with the potential clients from going back to the RE again because of not wanting to be given the cold shoulder!

I feel for his lack of ethics!
 
If I was in your shoes, I'd write a letter to the home owner explaining you were interested in viewing their home because you though it was for sale, however the agent (insert his name) indicated he didn't have the time or motivation to show you. I'd also include your name and contact phone number so if they wanted to take it up with the listing agent or Principle they could.

If I was a seller and an REA did this to someone who was interested in my home I'd definately want to know about it and would be pretty p1$$ed off.

Cheers
Buddybee
 
You actually had an agent ring back?

We bought an IP last year and NEVER had phone calls returned. Spent a lot of time chasing up agents, messages to call back were ignored.

I was hoping that a slowing market might instill a few manners.
Marg
 
LOL - I would definitely write to the home owners apart from the fact that when I asked for the house addresses he said "I don't play like that" umm.. I thought like what; you sell houses by describing them? I don't want to waste their time as much as I don't want my time wasted, hence why when I ask for an address I could drive past, see if I like it or not. He wouldn't email photographs or RE.COM links, he would tell me street addresses ... I am begining to think this guy is a real tool... good luck to him!

I have called the REA across the road from his office and arranged a REA to take us through all of the houses in the estate at 2:30pm tomorrow, from there we will most likely make our final decision on which one. We have shortlisted many but just want to buy ourselves one more looking session to guarantee ourselves we have given our choice of house and future IP a best chance possible.
 
Buddybee said:
If I was a seller and an REA did this to someone who was interested in my home I'd definately want to know about it and would be pretty p1$$ed off.
Click to expand...

You might want to know about it - but it could never be independently verified. It would be one of these "he said - she said" things that go around in circles and go nowhere.

If as the Vendor, and you confronted the REA and he said that he had fielded 55 enquiries on your behalf, most of which were just skimmers in his opinion, and he could confirm that the one out of 55 that actually made a formal written complaint about his conduct was a complete nutter and was rude and condescending to him after he did the courteous thing and called her back only to be told that she didn't even remember which property it was. He could then go on and explain that he had genuine enquiries in his opinion and they are nearing completion.

As the Vendor - you wouldn't know either way if he was telling the truth or not. The flexibility in tone and inflexion on the phone are fertile ground indeed for opinionated arguments - especially when he doesn't give a toss about her and she doesn't give a toss about him.

Bound to happen. Happens hundreds of times every day of the week.

Let's hope during your further 25+ house research, you don't encounter any REA's that deign to ignore or treat you less than like royalty. I'd be utterly shocked if you don't receive the same treatment from many other REA's. They want unconditional sales for their Vendors, not researchers.

As I said before - misalignment of business goals shall always cause this. Everyone always wants to be treated like the top dog - trouble is it doesn't always happen....and people get stroppy when they feel like they should be treated some way and it just doesn't happen.

Anyway - as you said, it was his loss, not yours.....but I get the distinct feeling via the initial posting that it's not quite water off a ducks back to you - just yet.
 
You said that you looked at about 25 houses and intend to look at 25 more, but at the same time told the agent that he could miss out on a sale today if he ignored you.

Reading between the lines i would say that he sees you as a time waster, and while you do intend to buy, it's not happening for a while yet.

If you intend to look at so many houses, why not just front up to heaps of open for inspections, no skin or effort off any body's nose.

It's not your god given right to drag them round every house in the suburb. If i was an agent, i'd stay away from you too.

They have to make a living just like everybody else.
 
ok, so by asking
a) where is the house and the address, we will go by and see and
b) can you email details of the place
is not time wasting, I asked for 2 small details, I didn't want to drag him around to look at houses, I wanted to know which property he was calling regarding as I had left a message and with my memory failing me, I didn't know which he was referring to... rather simple

We have seen many houses, but we are ready to buy when we see the one that ticks as many boxes as possible

What I put it down to is his loss, not mine and I will most likely buy a house from this guy I am meeting with tomorrow and just settle with what I have seen as of that point!

Talk about time wasting, this same agency is advertising a house in a street that does not even exist, infact they are advertising a 2 story house in a street that is only permitted to build 1 story houses, and their fellow REA in a near by suburb showed a photograph of a 2 story house for price that was reasonable, after rocking up to the house to see it, there is a big SOLD sign on it, when we approached the REA they said it was unit 2 they were advertising but they took a photo from the street and as the 2 story towers over the one that is for sale they couldn't see it.... Want to get started on time wasting?? Also being told that a house that was sold last week is still for sale and ot come and into the office, when they knowingly knew the house was sold, it has a sold sign out the front and is situated in the same street as another for sale that they had been at earlier that day (which is how we found out about that particular agency) ...

Totally over buying houses, just ready to settle on one most likely by the next fortnight!
 
QUOTE
Me 'that's great dude, we have finance and a deposit ready to go, you just lost out of a sale I will go to the real estate across the road and they will sell another house in the estate, loose the attitude you could of sold a house today'
__ hang up __
UNQUOTE

Sounds like Shift Workers Syndrome to me....
Makes you cranky and short fused, picky, and sucks the life out of you.

I did it for 27 yrs before giving up.

BTW who hung up? You or Him?
If it was you, then you probably just beat him to it. I would have hung up to a spray like that..

kp
 
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