Many property sellers who are contemplating listing their properties themselves wonder if their properties will take longer to sell than if they instead chose to sell their properties using the traditional real estate agent method.
The time it takes for a property to sell depends largely on the property’s list price. The second most important is the particular real estate agent (on traditional listings) or the particular seller (on flat rate MLS listings) and how well they suit ALL display requests. Third, what matters most is how well the property is displayed and marketed, along with whether or not a full commission is offered from the buyer’s agent.
For properties sold in 2012, the average number of days it took for residential properties to sell was:
Okanagan Main Line Real Estate Board – 132 days
Greater Vancouver Real Estate Board: 53
Our Flat Rate MLS Listing Company: 67
The Greater Vancouver Real Estate Board is the most popular real estate market in British Columbia, so it would make sense that its days on the market are much shorter than the average Okanagan number. Our listings tend to be more weighted with listings in the Lower Mainland area, but 36% of their listings in 2012 were from the Okanagan region. Having said that, it is pretty clear that our flat rate MLS listings sell for roughly the same time period as traditional listings.
The bottom line here is that the particular market, the property’s listing price, and listing in the MLS® system is much more powerful than whether or not a real estate agent is used to sell a property vs. the seller. It is also important that flat rate MLS sellers offer a full commission from the buyer’s agent to maximize the cooperation of local real estate agents. It is estimated that the number of real estate agent visits will be reduced by up to 90% depending on how much the seller of the property reduces the buyer’s agent commission that is offered. Therefore, we always highly recommend that a buyer’s agent commission of 3.255% on the first $ 100k and 1.1625% on the remainder be offered in the lower mainland and that 3.5% on the remainder of British Columbia. the first $ 100k and 1.5% on the rest if offered.
We are a broker and member of the Canadian Real Estate Association. The company specializes in creating flat-rate MLS listings and providing support and guidance in selling the property. We serve clients located in the province of British Columbia in Canada.
