The estate agents fee are they worth it

The 30 minute phone call
appointmnent agreed
15 minutes to get there
30 minutes to assess
1 hour to discuss and agree
1.5 hours preparing spec
40 minutes attend on brighter day for pictures of product
7 or 8 hours setting up promotion websites portals hardcopies, window cards
45 minutes per property preparing adverts
cost of adverts with no guarantee of selling every property
20 attendances in 12 months 15 min each way travel say 1 hour each viewing
20 minutes Vendor calling in calls to discuss market
20 minutes Vendor calling in to change price
4 or 5 hours agreeing contract terms
4 or 5 hours assisting with problems and there are always problems

Oh dear it hasnt come off and the deal is dead calculate the lost time

Another 10 viewings average time with buyer 1 hour and finally another deal
2 hours preparing & often amending several times the sale in hand details
few more hours meeting experts
several hours negotiations
several more hours chasing lawyers, surveyors, quotations

loose deal due to arguments over costings

few more hours retreaving deal between both sides

Finally a completion

Multiply this by 160 properties on your list and keep in mind that you may only sell 40 to 50 of them

Howm much work does an estate agent provide free of charge and how much do we actually get paid for. The get paid for part is a small percentage

Calculate the cost of this amount of time spent for a plumber electrician lawyer

Occasionally a property comes on the market and sells quickly, vendors often believe its down to the property. Often its more down to an agents costs in getting noticed by prospective buyers. The more hot buyers they have is often down to the more advertising and promotion that they do.

A buyer walks into an agents office or comes to find an agent because of the costs the agent has spent in attracting that buyer

Estate Agents do provide a good service for the charges they make. In UK commission is lower but there you expect to sell 4 or 5 times more property than in Spain.

Any Bargain property in Sotogrande spain´s luxury estate & sporting playground

Sotogrande property Tailor Made estate agents are finding the market very slow in Sotogrande. People coming to Spain with unrealistic expectations of what their money will buy. Yes there are a lot of bargains to be had but often the bargains are for property no one would want in the boom times never mind the crisis we face now.

Truth is that Sotogrande like many millionaire play grounds has been affected, but the average owner is not feeling the pressure to drop. Wealthy people even if feeling the pinch can juggle their finances and set bottom lines which are not consistant with say property prices drops in maybe a 3rd rate area. Sotogrande has seen price drops of around 25% to 35% not enough really for the cautious buyer. So people wait hoping that in another 6 to 12 months they will feel the pinch enough to drop further. Maybe some will drop a bit more but it will never be on mass. So the chances of those coming here for a week hoping to get a bargain of a life time are diminished. The real bargains drops of 45% & 50% of prices 2 years ago are few and far between and go quickly to people on the ground with a reservation fee in their hand.

This week I had a vendor call me saying he was happy to drop 100,000 off his 400,000 price tag. The fact is that in this particular development 99% of the buyers were British. Three years ago they would have sent 300,000 to spain to pay 400,000. Now they will still have to send a little over 300,000 to buy. So where is the bargain to the British buyer. It simply is not there and here lies the difficulty in selling to the British.