A Good REALTOR® Does More Than Show Homes

Call on Your Real Estate Agent to Help You With ALL Your Real Estate Needs!

Most people think of calling a REALTOR® at two times in their lives: when they are ready to sell their home and when they are ready to buy a home. In both cases, the REALTOR® is expected to do one main job - show homes.

But a good REALTOR® does more than show homes. A good REALTOR® wants you to call on him or her for any number of a long list of tasks and is prepared to help you with them. In fact, showing homes really makes up a very small percentage of a good real estate agent's daily tasks. Here are a few things you might not have known you could call your REALTOR® for:

Comparative Market Analysis. You just bought your home a year ago and aren't even close to thinking about moving yet, but you've noticed a lot of homes in your neighborhood going on and off the market during the year you've lived there. You find yourself wondering what those homes sold for, and perhaps also wondering what your own home is now worth.

Call your REALTOR®. Ask for a market analysis. Ask to know what other homes have sold for in your neighborhood and whether those prices have affected your home's value. Your REALTOR® will be happy to help.

A Referral to an Out-of-Town REALTOR®. Your niece has just graduated from college and is ready to buy her first home. She lives across the country in a town where neither you nor her parents have any contact. You're worried about her making a good decision, making a good investment, and having all the information she needs to do both of these things.

Call your REALTOR®. Ask for a referral to an agent in your niece's city. Give your REALTOR® as many details as you have about what your niece is looking for; she may even ask to call your niece to get more information before turning to her referral network. Many agents attend annual conferences and educational classes around the country and make many contacts with real estate agents they know they can trust. Through her extensive referral network, your REALTOR® can give you a referral anywhere in the world. Your REALTOR® will be happy to help.

1031 Tax-Free Exchanges. You own a rental property and are thinking about selling it and buying a vacation home at the beach so that your family can have a place to get together during the summers. You know that your rental property has appreciated a great deal since you bought it, and you've heard about the tax implications of selling an investment property. You want to be able to keep those profits and put them into your beach house, not hand over a large percentage to the government, but you aren't quite sure how to do so.

Call your REALTOR®. Ask for help doing a 1031 tax-free exchange. Your REALTOR® has a 1031 tax-free exchange company or a contact through her real estate attorney's office. Together, they can help you through what can be a difficult process and get you that beach house you're dreaming of. Your REALTOR® will be happy to help.

Of course, this is not an exhaustive list. Each REALTOR®'s areas of expertise are different, and you should contact your real estate agent to see what other services she can provide. For a complete list of the services my team and I provide, please email me!

A good REALTOR® is more than just a person with access to the Multiple Listing Service and a lockbox key. To get the most out of your real estate experience, make the call - your REALTOR® will be happy to help!

Copyright © 2008 Maura C. Gebhardt. All Content. All Rights Reserved.