Ethics and honesty are everything in business. We have always strictly followed the CCAR code of ethics and run our brokerage the same way. A code of ethics sets forth principles designed to govern our decision-making and distinguish right from wrong.
Unfortunately, not everyone in our industry has such a code of ethics or sticks to it if they do. Some companies will do or say anything to get and keep a deal.
Here’s an example of what I’m talking about: I’ve been approached about one company which, on more than one occasion, has taken on a listing and when their agreement is about to expire, suddenly a buyer appears. Much haggling happens back and forth, taking the seller well beyond the date of the expiration of the agreement. But since pretty much all broker agreements say that any interested buyers belong to the broker past the point of an agreement’s expiration date, the seller is forced to continue to work with the broker. Plus, the poor seller wants to sell his property, so he or she goes along with things in hopes that things with interested buyer eventually pans out.
In the end, the buyer turns out to be fictitious – and in at least one case, the fake buyer was the broker himself and the deal in the end never came to pass.
Or how about the broker that guarantees to buy your home if it doesn’t sell or the one one that has a list of ready and willing buyers once you list? The guarantee price is significantly lower than the true market value of the home and the magic list of buyers is suddenly not suitable for your property.
Now, I could comment on how this type of conduct is totally inappropriate, a conflict of interest and borderline illegal, but I think you get the idea here.
Again: ethics is everything! When selling your property through a third party real estate brokerage, make sure the broker you’re dealing with has strong moral and ethical standards or it could create nothing but trouble for you – and in the end, your property won’t get sold anyway.
One thing you can be assured of when you deal with Carriage House Real Estate: We will do our utmost to sell your property – and we won’t mislead you.
First, we’ll give you a fair valuation, not simply tell you what you want to hear about the value of your home. Some other brokers will do anything to get a deal, including inflating the price of a property. Since an overpriced property is likely to cause your home not to sell, we will never do that at Carriage House Real Estate. We have years of experience valuating property and are very good at coming up with a price that will help your home get sold for the maximum amount possible.
If a seller wants more for their property than we believe it’s worth, then we’re happy to walk away from the deal. We’ve done it many times and we’ll do it again (and again). We don’t need the business so badly that we feel compelled to compromise our professional ethics to get it.
Second, we won’t lie to you, whether you’re a seller or a buyer – about anything. Again, that’s poor ethical behavior. You’ll always get it straight from us.
Third, when you come to us initially to sell your property, we’ll be honest about the it’s marketability. If we don’t think we can sell it, then we won’t take on the listing. We’re not so anxious for listings that we need to fill ours up with less desirable properties just to create an impression.
Finally, if after taking on a listing we see that a property isn’t going to sell, we’ll tell you that as well. We can’t always predict the market. Sometimes we’re simply wrong — and if we are, we’ll tell you so.
The bottom line is this: When you do business with Carriage House Real Estate, you’ll get the straight truth from us, every step of the way. There is no fluff in our approach. We’re here to provide a service and we’ve gotten very good at what we do. We are – and will always be – ethical in our approach.
We look forward to serving you.
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