A Chicago Tribune report from Friday finds a silver lining – if however faint – in the housing crisis: Real-estate agents are educating themselves, expanding their vocabularies and improving their craft.
Here are a few choice quotes from the article:
“There has to be a paradigm shift in everyone’s thinking…When the boom hit, people couldn’t keep up. All you knew is that everyone wanted to buy quickly. It was more a matter of juggling the contracts. It wasn’t helping educate them so they can make an informed decision.”
-Joan Sinnott, Century 21 Lullo in Addison
“The real estate agent of 10 years ago is not the real estate agent of today. We’ve become more of a resource for our sellers, rather than you just hire us to sell. The agents today know they have to come to the table prepared and if they don’t, it’s a challenge.”
-Patrick O’Rourke, Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage
“[Buyers] should expect that an agent will go back to the basics. I’m constantly having to re-educate myself…We need to put ourselves in the position of building a pipeline for a future business. We have to now counsel them. Before, we were just salespeople. You bring it, we sell it. Now we’re going back to the fiduciary responsibility we have.”
-Marki Lemons, Rubloff Residential Properties