Why Landlords Should Avoid Using Real Estate Agents | Hacker News Reader

Why Landlords Should Avoid Using Real Estate Agents

blog.boxyroom.com

6 pointsboxyroom5 comments

I use a agent to rent my unts, the fees are nowhere near what this article states though. 1 month rent is the fee I pay.

Also, through the contacts and lead-flow my agent has, he ends up getting better qualified tenants who pay more than I would do myself, listing on craigslist.

He also handles all credit checks, background checks, etc.. on his own dime.

In my area, Agents charge landlords 1/2 a month's rent. Of that 1/2, (or one quarter of one months rent) goes to another agent if they bring a qualified tenant into the unit. I think 20% recurring every month is way too much, however I don't know the sources Boxyroom used. They are, however, in the business of listing rentals - so there's that.

Hey Boxyroom,

The link seems to redirect away from the post and straight into an email collector on the homepage.

But this aside, it's nice to see yet another start-up tackling the fact real estate transactions are less Amazon and more queuing for welfare.

We've seen, in London, New York and San Fran that merely putting the transaction online to cut out agents doesn't resonate with the vast majority of landlords. They aren't price sensitive, regardless of what they say. Their actions prove otherwise: consistently paying heavy fees, taking the first tenant with a reasonable offer and often not updating the property to increase tenant interest.

Happy to chat about what we're doing at Wigwamm to create incentive for landlords and agents to participate in a single market (tweet us out @WigwammHQ).

On the tenant side of this, we have rented both through and agent and directly from the owner. The latter has been by far the best in our experiences with lower rent for higher quality space.

In Dubai the rents are very high due to the agents, for a single property there will be at least 4 agents acting like tenants to the landlord, the 5th one will be actually staying in the property, landlords also knows this but still they follow this method for many years.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com