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Your Real Estate Agent Owes You

Brittany Kimble

Updated: Feb 27, 2024



All too often, I hear about real estate agents entering into relationships with buyers and sellers, then they go MIA. When joining the real estate industry, I was honestly surprised at the amount of times I heard this from clients.


I don't understand why. I get it, real estate agents are bullied daily by rude prospects. But when you decide to become a real estate agent you sign up to do your job and serve your clients. Buyers and sellers, I want you to know that you have the ability to fire your real estate agent.


Your agent owes you. In fact, once you have a contractual relationship with your real estate agent they have a fiduciary duty to serve you. The list of fiduciary duties apply to a broad range of obligations that your agent owes you.


Your agent is responsible for the following:

  • Loyalty

  • Obedience

  • Disclosure

  • Confidentiality

  • Reasonable care and due diligence

  • Accounting


Let’s go into what this means to you as the buyer/seller. Starting with loyalty, your agent must act in your best interest and avoid any and all conflicts of interest.


What this means to you is that your agent cannot put their own interests before yours either. Meaning, if your agent is planning to sell a house of his own and it may be desirable to you, they are not able to sell it to you for their own financial gain.


Loyalty in your relationship is EXCLUSIVE. If you have a great real estate agent, he/she will provide security for you in the transaction. Next is obedience. Real estate agents are obligated to carry out all legal instructions of their clients. (Emphasis on legal)


Although your agent is meant to be a trusted advisor and help guide you toward the best decision, ultimately every decision to be made is yours and your agent MUST follow your final instructions (within legal reason).


Your agent also owes you disclosure. This not only applies to contracts, but all information. Any information that could possibly influence your decision making must be made known to you. Whether it be rumors or facts, all known information must be passed over. (If you don't plan on using an agent, keep in mind that your competition is, and their agent is giving them all of the information and is keeping that information away from you, tread lightly if you don't have representation.)


Another responsibility owed to you as a client is confidentiality. This is self explanatory. In real estate, it’s vital to know what to say and what not to say in negotiation situations. Unless you have an exclusive relationship, the agent on the other side is using all your information to nourish their client. (Keep that in mind if you were considering buying or selling without a REALTOR®) However, your acting agent is going to make sure your information stays protected at all costs.


Lastly, I want to talk about the last two duties together. Reasonable care and due-diligence and accounting. Your representing real estate agent should strive to consume and understand more real estate knowledge than the average person.


He must stay informed about all things that could benefit you, harm you and/or affect your decision. This is what we call reasonable care and due-diligence. Accounting for all funds, property, documents, etc. is also the responsibility of your REALTOR®.


With all of these solid duties in place, there should really be no room for error. But I want to explain something briefly:


1. Agents don’t learn how to do business in real estate school.

Most agents are accustomed to the corporate environment where you have a chain of command or hierarchy and a manager who keeps you on track and tells you what to do.


Unfortunately, real estate is an independent contractor position. Meaning, you run your own business. You are your own boss. I think this can be a culture shock for some agents and they don’t always perform well in that type of environment.


2. There is a difference between a real estate agent and a REALTOR®.

Every real estate agent is not a REALTOR®. Let me explain. A real estate agent has taken all of the required education and paid the required fees. A REALTOR® is a licensed real estate agent who volunteered to join the Realtor Association and follow The Code of Ethics.


REALTORS use specific contracts to keep us and our clients protected and we contribute to the real estate industry from the inside. REALTORS® abide by a Code of Ethics, regular agents do not. This is something to consider when hiring your agent.


You are definitely less likely to experience your agent going MIA on you if they take their business that much more seriously as to agree to volunteer to be a part of the National Association of REALTORS®.


As a client, you also have responsibilities to your real estate agent, but I’ll dive into that in another blog. Let me know if you have any feedback on this or book a call with me if you need any consultation!


Click this link if you are interested in having a conversation about purchasing a home or selling your home.





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