Selling your home is both exciting and stressful. Most homeowners head into the process without understanding the many nuances involved. Sellers can become frustrated if their home isn’t moving off the market as quickly as they had expected or they aren’t getting offers as high as they had hoped.
When this happens, you can easily fall into the trap of blaming your real estate agent. While it’s not out of the realm of possibility that your agent isn’t doing everything they can to get your home sold, most of the time it’s a result of market conditions, unrealistic price expectations or issues that need to be resolved. You might be inclined to switch agents, but here’s why that’s usually not a good idea.
Marketing Is Already in Place
Odds are, your agent has already put together a solid marketing plan for your home, including online exposure through home-sale portals, social media coverage, print materials, photography, virtual tours and open houses, etc. Ask your agent to provide you with an itemized list of the marketing plan, and if it looks solid, stick with it. Switching agents means starting from scratch.
You Could Miss a Peak Sales Cycle
Switching to a new agent starts the process all over again from the beginning. This could mean you miss a key selling season as the new agent takes time to build their marketing plan.
It Could Throw Up a Red Flag
When you switch agents, your home is temporarily taken off the market, then reappears being represented by a new agent with new branding and a new marketing plan. This could signal to buyers that there’s something wrong with your home and assume that it was the agent’s decision to abandon ship.
You’ve Wasted Relationship-Building
The time you’ve invested with your agent— sharing your concerns, needs and priorities—is critical to the home-selling process and shouldn’t be abandoned unless there is a serious conflict that can’t be overcome. When you switch agents you’re back at square one in terms of relationship-building.
Keep in mind that the most important factor in working with an agent is trust. If you trust your agent, ask them why your home isn’t selling as fast as you’d anticipated or garnering the price point you had hoped for. A professional agent will be able to explain the circumstances that are causing the delay and offer a few solutions for moving things along.
