Problem with real estate agents on Samui

[monk280915]

My wife & I had a home built for the purpose of selling it. The construction was finished over 4 weeks ago & we started contacting real estate agents on Koh Samui, well before the holidays,  to list it on their web sites. We contacted 11 total, 4 replied, & as of today only 2 have our home listed on their site. We just can not understand why these agencies will not even return a phone call or answer an email. It is in a good area and a beautiful design with landscaped yard. It's not a grass hut or in a bad neighborhood. This whole experience has us puzzled. Anyone have any insight into this?

[khunPer]

Why don't you try Thai Visa's property-sales..?

Think some – if not most – agents want's a property-for-sale exclusive; that was my experience when we looked for property at Samui some years back. Sometime they "share", meaning if they know another agent has just that property a client looks for, then they will show it and make a split on commission.

[monk280915]

Thai Visa property sales was the first agency I contacted. We were contacted by the Samui agent, made an appointment & he never showed or called back. I can understand they don't want to share, but we can't even get them to talk to us to find out if we have it listed elsewhere.

[impulse]

What agreement do you have in place with the agents who have it listed already?   How would any of them be assured to get paid anything if they bring you a buyer and then you and the buyer conspire to cut them out of the deal?

[monk280915]

We have signed contracts with the 2 who have our house listed for 5% of the sale price

[TonyFernandez]

I have been looking to buy property on Samui and had to realize that many real estate agents are aggressively pushing off-plan projects where they make presumably more money. Or they promote only certain properties where they have a vested interest. 

 

[robertthebruce]

Off Plan....never , I once considered it, many years ago, and guess what, the shell of the building is still standing, like a Ghost.....

 

thankfully I never bought into it....

[khunPer]

57 minutes ago, TonyFernandez said:

I have been looking to buy property on Samui and had to realize that many real estate agents are aggressively pushing off-plan projects where they make presumably more money. Or they promote only certain properties where they have a vested interest. 

 

Agents wish to sell properties that pays them the highest commission. You will need to contact a number of agents, and also search yourself; i.e. some only has a sign with a phone-number – talking from experience – depending of what you are looking for, not all properties may be for sale through established agents. I found mine, a prime location, through word-of-mouth from locals, where one acted like agent, i.e. got a commission from seller for finding the buyer and helping seller with paperwork – it actually happened twice on Samui...

[monk280915]

5 hours ago, TonyFernandez said:

I have been looking to buy property on Samui and had to realize that many real estate agents are aggressively pushing off-plan projects where they make presumably more money. Or they promote only certain properties where they have a vested interest. 

 

Well....I have a house for sale if your still in the market

[Mole]

Well, you could take it as a hint that your property isn't that "hot" for the agencies to priority, except the most desperate ones who need all the portfolio they can get.

 

Could be not to good location, or way too high asking price, or house plan is weird or combination of all. Mind you, I've seen it all and often wonder exactly what's going on in the seller's heads...

 

If a house is really "hot", you can be sure that all the agencies would come and take pics and try to sell it for you as soon as you hung up the phone with them. Most already have a portfolio of interested buyers waiting for a nice house at a right price, so a sale can be made quite quickly if a property is good enough. The agencies would already have a good idea which property is suitable for which potential buyer.

The fact that you're telling that even the interests from agencies has been this lackluster, should give you some reality check. I'm surprised even thaivisa's own guys didn't get back to you, so obviously something is not quite right with your property...

 

There is a huge oversupply of properties for sale and everybody and their brother thinks they can make a good profit by buying empty land and building a nice house. The reality is that most of them end up with having that house for years (many putting it for short term rent on airbnb while waiting to sell) before desperately agreeing on a sale at break-even or even at a loss just to be able to get rid of it and get cash in return.

I wish you all the best luck to sell that house quickly. But there are hell lot of other sellers who want a share of that pool of "luck".

Edited January 3, 2017 by Mole

[Mole]

Have you even invested in a professional photographer to take photos of your house, so you are able to give some decent pics to the agencies? This surely should speed things up.
Or were you expecting them to do all this work for you, taking photos and all that?

 

Unless you yourself are a good at taking photos of properties, I highly recommend you invest in a professional to get it done for you.

You want to sell a house for millions, investing a few thousand in photos should be trivial.

 

Don't take photos with your phone and give them to agencies. They probably wouldn't take you seriously if you also don't take them seriously!

Edited January 3, 2017 by Mole

[monk280915]

Everything has been completed for an agency to list the home. Detailed description of the construction & materials used & photos of professional quality. While I have never been paid for taking photos I do have over 25 years of photography experience, which I guess would make me a darn good amateur. Everything is in place & done properly. Maybe as you stated before the market is saturated at the moment & our property just doesn't stand out enough.

[NickJ]

Part for the course here. Have you put a sign on it with contact info. They hate that. They figure they will just get cheated out of there 5% 

 

[monk280915]

No I haven't put a sign on it, but that sounds like a good idea.

 

[Mole]

A for sale sign in front of house is of course something you should have done to begin with. Most other houses for sale have that. It's a fair game if you manage to sell to anyone who contact you directly via your phone number on the sign, then of course you are entitled to sell it at your own discretion.

 

No agencies should have problems with that unless you have an exclusive contract with them, which personally I would not sign any exclusive contract with anyone. Why limit your own opportunities with only 1 company?

[khunPer]

21 hours ago, monk280915 said:

No I haven't put a sign on it, but that sounds like a good idea.

 

I believe that's the first thing to do anywhere one wants to sell property – I have many passing by asking for houses for rent and buy; if I've seen I sign I know gladly tell interested people, often word-of-mouth is very good sales-advertisement – I bought twice at Samui based on that only; and my neighbor also.

 

Mind you that many property buyers at Samui are not "farangs", but Thais and other Asians, but they may not always be interested in same kind of property, or see same values as we farangs see. In my Scandinavian home-country, we use to have the real-estate agent to suggest a sales-price, which from the agent's professional experience shall be the right level for that kind of property; however in Thailand it seems like property prices sometimes are wishful thinking, and other times appears rather low, even almost next to each other in same area. If you intend to sell a house fast, it's a question of finding the right balance of price and location for the poteniontal type of buyers. Building a single house by the purpose of selling it, presumably with a profit, might sometime be difficult business, as one can be in competition with building constructors making projects with economies of scale; so sometimes hard just to cover the costs of a single construction, if that particular house is not in a prime location, or in other way superior to other properties.