Real Estate Articles How to Select a Real Estate Professional - General Tips Mortgage Secrets Exposed - Real Estate. How Anyone, With Any Credit Can Get Any Mortgage Fast & Easy. Get Any Loan With Bad Credit: Mortgages, Home Loans And More. The real estate industry, like most industries, has its share of true professionals, dedicated men and women that provide superior, value-added service to their clients. And it has its share of those that fall short of this mark. Given that a home is typically the largest, most valuable asset that most people will ever own, it certainly would make sense to only entrust the purchase or sale of that home to someone that is truly an expert in the very dynamic, very complex game of real estate. Here is some advice you can take to increase the chances of ending up with a quality professional: While "local knowledge" is certainly a good thing, do not select an agent just because they purport to be "the neighborhood" expert. So much good data and information is available to the average Realtor that having prior neighborhood-specific knowledge or experience is not critical to being successful in selling a given home. Obviously, the more the agent knows about the subject property and its immediate surroundings, the better. But what separates a good agent from a great agent are the intangibles: knowing how to properly price a home, how to properly market a home and how to skillfully negotiate a successful sale. An agent that possesses these attributes can work in any area, as long as they have access to the applicable comparables data. The only time that the neighborhood-specific-knowledge factor should come into play is in a situation where you have two agents of seemingly equivalent talents, and you are looking for something to tip the scales in one direction or the other. The Real Estate Under Ground. Stop Screwing Around, And Make Money In Real Estate This Month Without Credit Checks. Do not utilize the services of someone that is not a full-time practitioner. Your home is probably the most valuable asset you own. Why would you entrust this to someone that is not fully committed to the business of helping people buy and sell homes? Would you use a part-time builder to build your dream home? Would you use a part-time attorney to handle an important legal matter? Would you use a part-time doctor to diagnose a potentially dangerous medical condition? I hope not! So, at a minimum, make sure that the Realtor you select is a full-time agent. Don't be impressed because an agent claims to sell all of his or her listings quickly. This may simply be an indication that the agent under-prices their listings, which is the last thing that you would want your agent to do. Any agent can sell any home quickly if you allow them to price it "below market." A professional that is truly dedicated to getting you top dollar is one that will push the envelope and attempt to get you the highest price the market will bear. And these sales typically do not happen quickly. Tip! Closing the Deal � Use your real estate attorney to prepare the paperwork and close the transaction. Before money changes hands, do your due diligence, have it appraised, order Title report and insurance, a survey, research building code and health code violations. Don't be impressed because an agent claims to sell hundreds of homes every year. This is a business where quality of service is far more important that quantity of service. There is positively, absolutely a limit to the number of transactions an agent can do in a given year before quality of service suffers. To use another analogy, would you be impressed by a neurosurgeon that claimed to have performed "500 surgeries last year!" A better choice would be the professional that performed 50 surgeries REALLY WELL than the person that did 500 quickly. While we are certain that many of you may scoff at this analogy, please remember this: the difference between a good agent and a great agent can often be measured in thousands, or tens of thousands, of dollars in your bank account. You WANT an agent that is fully focused on your specific situation at all times. When agents take on more than they can handle, the quality of the service that they provide goes down. These are just the general tips to consider when selecting a Realtor. I've written more about specific questions you can ask to increase the odds of finding a true professional in another article, which you can read at the Professional One website. Good luck! Michael McClure is the founder of Professional One Real Estate, a brokerage located in Plymouth, Michigan. After graduating from Michigan State University with a degree in accounting, McClure worked as a Certified Public Accountant for Price Waterhouse for nearly a decade. After leaving accounting in 1991, he began selling real estate. To date, he and his partner, RE/MAX Hall of Fame Member Phyllis Lemon, have cumulative lifetime sales of approximately $500M. McClure also volunteers on the Professional Standards Committee (a self-governing body of the local association of realtors that acts in a judge-and-jury-like fashion regarding ethics complaints and arbitration disputes) of Western Wayne Oakland County Association of Realtors. He sat for and passed the State of Michigan's Associate Real Estate Broker's examination in December 1996. McClure and his team have developed one of Metro Detroit's top ranking real estate websites http://www.professionalone.com.