I am accepting referrals in Connecticut, most of the Fairfield, New Haven and surrounding areas with a 40% (from my gross comission) referral fee being paid to a licensed agent who refers the client to me.

I work in New Haven County (near Yale University), Hartford and also near Fairfield/Westport/Greenwich/Darien areas.

Please contact me with any questions you may have! yana@cthomestore.com


Thanks! You can check my website (I am working on it right now, sorry it's not finished yet) http://www.cthomestore.com

Hi Yanavp,
I feel people should share views and opinions which is why i am posting a reply to your post.

I would never give a referral to someone who offered me 40% comission. Why? Well, #1 a client is a client for life and i will always take care of them and make sure they are in good hands. When someone offers 40% as a fee, it says 2 things to me:
#1 - that the Realtor is desperate for business
#2 - that the Realtor will not take as good care of my client because they are not making much, or as much as they should be.

I see from your website that your a Century 21 agent (nice pic btw). From your post i imagined you were part of a small mom & pop operation.

But i guess some people out there do not see things like i do, and see the bigger $$$ check for them, so who knows maybe it does work. Out of curiousity, have you gotten any leads from here?

Interesting thoughts Arthur. I agree with you.

The agent needs to have a good reason for offering 40%. One agent in my area was giving 50% for all Asian-culture clients, but he said it was because he wanted to dominate that market and had a strong team he was building.

Most agents actually liked his approach because 1) some agents don't know how to work well with other cultures anyway, 2)many agents aren't after that market, and 3) most people liked that the agent was honest. He wasn't inexperienced and had a team, so it sounded like he'd take good care of clients that we'd refer to him.

Hello:

Thanks for the feedback. The great thing about business is that we are all free to have our own opinions about the best way to handle client situations. Clearly, we differ in opinion, which is fine with me. Our methods are extremely successful and work for us quite well.

I can assure you we are not deperate for business, though I suspect your inquiry about my success rate may indicate you are interested in trying our methods to improve your sales numbers? In terms of taking care of clients, once they are referred to us, we treat them as our own client - which they are.

I would also like to suggest that you are in business for a number of reasons; first your enjoyment of the real estate market, secondly the freedom the job allows you, and finally - of course to make money. If all other issues are equal, why in the world would you not take a 40% fee share?? Especially if it was with the largest regional realtor...my point of view btw is that the fee arrangement keeps both of us involved with a vested interest in closing the deal for the client. Your way creates a disconnect for you with no guarantee of better treatment for your client. But to each his own....

Good luck to you.

p.s. Yes, my method generates large numbers...

Hi Yanavp,
I don't claim to be a real estate expert, and am always interested to hear about what works for people. If this works for you, great.

Am i thinking of adopting your idea myself? No. I've used homegain in the past and may drop that due to the 30% referral fee they demand.

Its also worth mentioning that what works in one part of the country, may not work in another. People are different, the work the realtors do is different, so different methods need to be applied to different markets. A top producer in NY may not be able to duplicate that success in AZ (in fact, a AZ GRI instructor who helped write the AZ contract and is a top producing agent got burned pretty bad in a transaction he was doing in NY on behalf of a national firm he works with because the rules/practices were different).

If this works for you, excellent. Do not take my comments as an attack on your working practices.

p.s. i would add in your original post that you are a Century 21 agent, as that will carry some weight and other Century 21 agents may be more likely to use you if they know that you are all part of the same company.

Agree, first I thought that it was an opinion from the U.K. As you may or may not know, the commission structure's are different in there. While most of the U.K. industry feeds off of a transaction fee of about 1.5 - 2% instead of 5 - 6% transaction fee in the U.S.. This allows us to do a number of things above and beyond just listing the property as available as in the U.K...but after I figured that it was just your picture icon...

I'm actually a Brit living in Yuma AZ.

UK & USA - totally different ball game when it comes to real estate. Pretty much nothing is the same.

Aha, you see, but you are still thinking like Brit sometimes ;-)
I am the russian one living in CT and it's all different there as well.
I enjoy working with the buyers and don't mind sharing. Within my state it's common that agents call each other and take clients for 50% referrals.

Out of curiousity, whats the typical sales price out where you are?

It depends...South, close to NY, 1500-2000 sq f ranch can cost as close to 800K, 3000 can be over 1M depends where is it. North, anything for the same from 300 to 700K. All depends..I moved north (30 min away) and the prices are as twice-three times lower than where I lived before.

I guess that explains the 40% as well.... The average price here is about $200,000....high end usually up to $400,000, low end $125,000. Even at 60% to you, you probably make more than i do at 100% lol

Lol, actually even where I am now for 200K you can get a good mobile home or a small condo.
Rents go from 2K/month for 1 bedroom where I moved from and 2 brm apartment was 800K ...insane, I know...so I will take 30%....ok!