Interviewing a Listing Agent? Ask Him or Her to Bring Their MLS Production Print-out  

The MLS printout for Golden Real Estate below shows the information that can be gleaned about individual agents and their brokerages. I’m showing our company report, but I could have shown my personal report. This print-out shows our production since Jan. 1st of this year.

The Production Section at top summarizes the report, showing that we had 46 listings since Jan. 1st, three of which we sold ourselves.  We had 21 buyer-side closings. The right-hand column shows the average of closed price (CP) to listing price (LP) — 102.47% for all MLS sold listings but much better for Golden Real Estate’s sold listings — 104.73%.

In the Production Detail section, the right-hand column shows how many days each sold listing was on the MLS before going under contract. Notice there are no zero days in MLS (“DIM”) because every listing was exposed to the full market so it would attract the most buyers, and yet there are few listings that took over a week to sell.

The “City” column lets you know where the agent (or company) does most of its business. The “List Price” and “Close Price” columns are also instructive. I’ve circled the two most recent sales as examples of how much above the listing price we sold those listings, thanks to our “auction style” of handling multiple offers, as opposed to the “highest and best” approach of most listing agents. It takes more work, but yields better results (a higher price) for our sellers.

This is not to suggest that an agent’s production is the sole criterion you should consider in choosing your listing agent.  However, we learn from experience, which comes from actual transactions, not from years in the business. An agent with only five years’ of licensure but who does a dozen-plus transactions a year can be more “experienced” than an agent who has done a couple transactions a year over a 20-year career.

And let’s not forget about testimonials. Ask for them, and look for online reviews, too. We like www.RatedAgent.com, because it only displays reviews solicited from actual clients following a closing, so the reviews can’t be phonied up or altered in any way.