Buying or renting a property is an important decision. Therefore you need to be sure that you are doing everything carefully to acquire the property that suits your tastes, needs and budget. To do so, you must choose a good real estate advisor, who must have certain characteristics and tools to provide you the best support during the process.

This is everything you need to know before hiring an agent:

A real estate consultant is a professional dedicated to providing advisory services and management related to the purchase and rental of properties. In general, the goal of a real estate agent is to accompany the parties throughout the purchase/rental process, from the choice of the ideal property to the legal advice and management of all the procedures and contracts involved.

  • Trust: Whether you are looking to buy or sell, the most important aspect of the real estate process is to be satisfied with the end result. Choosing the best real estate agent is about finding someone who understands your interests and shares your values.
  • Responsibility: A real estate agent must be a highly responsible professional, given that is working with significant investments.
  • Empathy: In the sales business it is essential to put yourself in the other person’s shoes to understand their  motivation. The advisor must understand why someone wants to buy/rent a property or sell it.
  • Negotiation skills: In the world of sales, negative responses are very frequent, so a real estate advisor must have the ability to persuade, negotiate and be persistent in order to close deals.
  • Marketing plan and valuation of the property: There are many options to value, sell and/or buy a property, thanks to the potential of the Internet. Therefore, it is necessary to put the property in all possible channels (internet, billboards, agencies, digital platforms, etc.). To achieve this, you should choose a good real estate consultant who is able to make a marketing plan based on the characteristics of the property (size, price and location).
  1. What type of real estate you specialize in. Selling luxury mansions is not the same as specializing in offices or apartments.
  2. How many properties or clients are they working with when they take your contract?
  3. How you evaluate and choose among potential prospects? Rather than receiving a lot of visits, it is better to choose carefully which ones have the most potential to negotiate with.
  4. What type of clients does they deal with (target). Ask if they have a database of clients interested in the location of your property. An affirmative answer will save time in the process.
  5. How the promotional plan of your property will be executed. It is important to understand what tools will be used to communicate that your property is for sale or rent. Also, how photographs or videos will be taken.
  6. How they will organize the visitors in your property. This aspect is fundamental to guarantee the safety of you, your family and your property.
  7. Do you collaborate with other real estate agents to expand your sales force? A negative answer may be an indication that it is a person who will only look after it’s commission rather than your interests as client.
  8. A professional real estate consultant will not take the price at which you want to sell or rent as the final word. If the price you are aiming for does not match the market reality, a responsible agent will tell you why it doesn’t work and give you the numbers to prove it.
  9. How they qualify the ideal buyer or landlord to close the deal. Of course, it is not only important that the prospective client has the required budget, but that they had the legal credentials to execute the transaction with full transparency.
  10. How much your fee will be. After answering all of the above questions, it is important to know the amount of the charging commission.

What do I need to know to choose a good real estate consultant?

Their recommendations

A good strategy is to ask your close circle of family and friends if anyone has recently used the services of a real estate consultant and how it went with that person. Surely this way you will get some good recommendations!

Doing a research on the Internet is also a good idea to prospect and evaluate which one will be the best option for you.

Their credentials

Once you have a recommended person, you must verify its  credentials. This is very important because the real estate agent will not simply be in charge of showing the property, but will also have tasks related to negotiating offers and legal procedures.

You must verify the credentials to find a  proper certification to hire any agent.

Importance of belonging to a group

Having a network of contacts and belonging to a group of agencies is important since having a real estate database is the best way to ensure that the property will be sold at a good price and according to the market.

In addition, the real estate advisor will have interested clients that are reliable and with good credentials.