Author Topic: Buying the house I'm renting, should I get my own realtor?  (Read 1022 times)

Ives

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Buying the house I'm renting, should I get my own realtor?
« on: October 13, 2020, 06:00:55 AM »
I spoke with the realtor in the real estate department of the property management company we rent this house through.  He spoke with the owner and he said he'd sell it to us for x amount.  I said we can't do that, we can only afford x amount and he came back saying the owner would do that.  He owns 100 properties and wasn't looking to buy but would sell to us for that price.

Should I get my own realtor? What would be the pros and cons of using my own realtor vs the in office realtor?

Fishindude

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Re: Buying the house I'm renting, should I get my own realtor?
« Reply #1 on: October 13, 2020, 07:00:40 AM »
Probably no advantage to getting another realtor involved, you don't even need a realtor. 
Any good title company can handle everything.

ctuser1

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Re: Buying the house I'm renting, should I get my own realtor?
« Reply #2 on: October 13, 2020, 07:14:12 AM »
You probably need a Real Estate lawyer.
(That is what I have been told by others, not an expert in this area, so ready to be corrected).

Do you have access to legal plans through work?

If so, you can probably engage a RE lawyer through that. I know a colleague who closed with a Hyatt Legal (now called Metlife legal) plan attorney - zero cost to him besides the $25/month plan cost.


cool7hand

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Re: Buying the house I'm renting, should I get my own realtor?
« Reply #3 on: October 13, 2020, 09:11:36 AM »
You don't need a realtor. Depending on your jurisdiction, you'll need an title company and/or attorney to process the transaction and ensure you obtain clean title.

PGSD

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Re: Buying the house I'm renting, should I get my own realtor?
« Reply #4 on: October 13, 2020, 02:10:56 PM »
You don't need a realtor. Depending on your jurisdiction, you'll need an title company and/or attorney to process the transaction and ensure you obtain clean title.

The above is correct (I've bought several times without a realtor, we used a RE lawyer for the agreement paperwork, a title company and your bank of choice for the mortgage). I'd get a good home inspector (find them yourself via Yelp rather than get the sellers agent's referral). You will likely also need a termite inspection. Use the inspections results to get a buyer credit for any bigger repairs.


Ives

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Re: Buying the house I'm renting, should I get my own realtor?
« Reply #5 on: October 14, 2020, 01:39:09 PM »
So I definitely shouldn't just use the realtor at the property management company?

cool7hand

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Re: Buying the house I'm renting, should I get my own realtor?
« Reply #6 on: October 15, 2020, 05:11:13 AM »
Realtors want a percentage of the deal for helping you buy. You don't want need help with that because you already negotiated the deal. You want to pay other professionals flat fees for the services they provide. Pay a lawyer or title company to help with clean title. Pay a home inspector to make sure that you identify any structural or other problems before the deal is closed. Use the lawyer to negotiate with the seller to fix anything requiring fixing. Etc.

affordablehousing

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Re: Buying the house I'm renting, should I get my own realtor?
« Reply #7 on: October 15, 2020, 03:56:32 PM »
If you want a realtor, you want a realtor representing your interests, not one commingled with the seller, or even the seller's property manager. That said, agents, at least in our market take collectively 5% of the purchase price in fee. As a buyer you don't pay directly for it, but the seller must have the price be 5% higher to account for the fees they need to pay out. It is common to forgo realtors in order to prevent that piece of the pie from being lost to 3rd parties. If you can negotiate a reduced price to account for forgoing realtors, that's the value, if not, they can only help represent you better and guide you through the inspection and negotiation process. By negotiating the price already, you may have lost the advantage a realtor would help you maintain.