Well you can live pretty fat and write almost everything down in your corp.

Keep buying investment properties and use depreciation to reduce taxes down to almost nothing.

On paper you don't pay much to yourself but live very well while paying almost no taxes.

I tell clients I charge what I charge and here is why.I might lose 1 out of 10 commercial listings.Really I don't mind to lose that business.If the sellers mindset is cut,cut,cut the commission and sees brokers/agents as not having value then you are doomed from the start.

I will let another broker take it and get pounded from the seller and I will take the listing later after they are more open to what I have to say.

ver well said,

i tell clients out right..
i charge more, because i do more and provide more value..
do you want some cost cutting agent cutting corners with your
equity?
whats more important to you
? the commission..or netting the most amount of money?

for cost cutting competition..
i tell sellers..
great..how does it feel knowing that agent doesnt have the backbone to fight for thier own pockets?
great, so you want an agent thats about getting less..rather than more?
wow ..really? and that agent let you negotiate thier own fee
without a fight? how well will they negotiate with buyers on your price?

Just wanted to chime in quickly. I can explain the very low commission rate going in my area (north of Greater Toronto) by the fact that house prices are IN THE SKY, and the market is VERY active and very much seller-market. Hence, sellers are not so motivated and play their own game. But I'm not complaining - even if I'm splitting my tiny 3.5% with the buyers agent, keeping only 1.5%, I will earn about 10,000 from AN AVERAGE sale (minus the split, of course), and those sales usually keep coming, as more and more buyers want a piece of my beautiful community! And those damn buyers' agents still make a hefty 2.5%! Just imaging that from 750,000$ (very average price) subdivision house! :rockon:

yes, quite different than if many of your sales are significantly under 200,000.

I'm telling you, it's crazy up here! Townhouses 1500 sqft fly for half a million bucks in 2 DOM.

Houses that were selling for 700,000 here may sell for the low 400,000s today. When prices were high, they didn't want to pay because I made "so much money". Now that prices are lower, they don't want to pay because they're "making less" so I should too. I find that no matter what the price range, there are people who will try to get the commission down.

I wrote an offer on a 65k dollar home last week. Not only that, but I am ALSO working a low ball offer on my 99k dollar listing. Don't you wish you were in Central Louisiana?

yes true..this year i have been forced to sell some 200k homes
in that case we need to try at least to get 3%
if not then at least 2.5%

Our average sale price in our MLS is about $167,000. :-/

That said, MY average sold price is $228,000 because I have a client with new construction homes that all go much higher and I also just sold a whopper of a listing (for here), almost 2 million...without that I'd probably be skirting right around that MLS average...

Couple years ago you couldn't find a decent place under 150,000 - 150 was the line in the sand and that was even marginal...if you wanted updated/modern it had to be closer to 200,000 and higher.

Now I'm seeing lots and lots of nice homes SITTING at 120,000, 130,000...and more and more homes are going just under that 100,000 mark (but they are still not modernized, many were "updated" in the 1980s....one listing I saw was bragging in the private remarks "Home was TOTALLY REMODELED in 1987!" And I was like...wow. In 1987 I was a hot young chick with a black Iroc-Z28 Camaro...but I aint' that no more!")

Oh wait, I had only the white PLAIN Camaro in 1987...I got the Iroc-z in 1989. LOL

Yeah, very sad. Is there any place that was spared?

I just got under contract on a $200k property. (This will be my first--EVER--transaction with a sub-$300k purchase price.) And to think I actually agonized over whether handling this sale would be worth my time.

I feel better now. Geez.

LOL

Hey FSBO, I'm in North Louisiana. I am in the luxury market here. My listings require whitewall tires before I'll list them!

I just took a floor call yesterday from a "buyer" who had a mid-500s credit score, no money in the bank and wanted to spend AT MOST $700/mo. on her mortgage (Yes, that is PITI).

There are a lot of people out there dreaming of home ownership looking to spend less than $100,000. Problem is, many don't want to put in the work to make $100,000 or less into a livable situation.

The good news is, at least she took my advice and called a lender to see where she stood before wasting any of my real time.