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I Didn't Pay My Realtor Enough

February 18, 2022 09:17 AM Comment(s) By Amy

A referral for an amazing agent

We've been a vendor in the real estate industry for over a decade now.  We serve groups across the country, from individual agents up to the large Associations and MLSs.  Other than our unnatural love for Open Houses, this past summer was the first opportunity we've had to experience being on the client side of real estate since we bought our own house almost 20 years ago.  


Last summer, we commenced the process of selling my in-law's home in Pennsylvania.  It was a small house they built in the 80's, and spent most every summer there for the past several decades.  The description on the flyer called it "cute as a button", and it was.  It had a very cabin-like feel.  But it hadn't been updated since it was built.  And like many homes inhabited by elderly adults, a lot of the maintenance had been neglected.  In other words, we knew there was some work that needed to be done.  We considered selling it as-is, but decided that a small investment could do wonders and make a really nice vacation property or starter home for someone.  Plus with the market as crazy as it was, we figured we'd more than make up for it.


The biggest issue we had was that we live in Nevada, and as business owners we didn't exactly have time to manage the process ourselves from across the country.  We needed an agent who knew the area, knew all the contractors, and one who we could trust to get it all done.  That agent was Kim Mills of Coldwell Banker Realty.   If you visit Kim's webpage, her tagline is "Service...it makes The Difference!", and it perfectly describes her.  


When we chose her to list the property, we knew we had a roof leak, and we thought that was the biggest problem.  She suggested coordinating with the homeowner's insurance, and it turned out a large portion of the cost was covered.  Hooray!  We then decided to get a full inspection so we could proactively fix anything else that might prevent the house from smoothly going to close.  It went downhill from there.  There were a handful of "not-up-to-code" issues, from minor things like GFCI outlets to the major structural issue that required the second story deck to be completely rebuilt.  The roof guys removed some wallboard during their repair and discovered mold.  The septic guys discovered intrusive tree roots and we almost needed to replace the whole system.  And let's not forget about the basketball size wasp's nest inside the wall.  If you've seen the movie "The Money Pit", that was this house.  Kim was there for all of it.  Coordinating, giving suggestions, offering solutions, and just being an all-around superhero.  


I don't know what we would have done without her managing the process.   And in our opinion, she didn't make nearly enough money for the amount of time and effort she invested.  If we had to pay Kim by the hour for all the work she did, I'm certain she would have made far more than her contracted compensation.  For better or for worse, that's not how this industry works.  As her client, I'm sad that she didn't make more from our listing.  But as a business owner, referrals are gold.  So this blog and the subsequent email campaign we'll send out to the many contacts in our CRM system is our additional payment to Kim.  If we were the stats vendor in her market, we would build her a custom branded dashboard to use in her marketing, too, but this will have to do for now.


There are a lot of things changing quickly in the real estate world these days.  In a world where iBuyers and online portals are trying to disrupt and take over the industry, agents who differentiate themselves through their quality service will continue to thrive, like Kim.  


Thank you Kim.

Amy