Why doesn't my agent want to list my property?

If you’ve been interviewing agents and find for some reason that they don’t seem as enthusiastic about your property as you’d like maybe it’s because they don’t want to be the first one to list your property. Most experienced agents will tell you they’d rather be the second or third rather than the first agent to list a property.

Why would they say that? Wouldn’t anyone want to list a property first so as to have the first chance to sell it and earn a listing commission? Well yes, but that’s only if they think your property will sell. If they think the property won’t sell, and let’s be candid here most of the time it’s because they believe you want too much money for the property, they’d just as soon another agent has it first. They prefer that agent has to deal with your frustration at not getting it sold.

Most of the time that first agent will earn the wrath of the seller for “not working hard enough”, or “never showing the property”, or “not advertising it enough”, or some other fault that makes the seller certain the only reason the property did not sell is because of the inadequacies of his agent. Now there are occasions when those criticisms are fair and valid.

But if you’ve talked with several agents and they all seem lukewarm to listing your property they are telling you what you probably don’t want to hear. You are pricing your property too high for this market. They’d just as soon you learned your lesson about the realities of this market at the expense of another agent rather than them. So that by the time you turn to them you will be far more realistic about what your property will likely bring.

There isn’t an experienced agent out there, who hasn’t lost a listing, and endured a frustrated seller only to watch the seller lower the price significantly for the second or third agent, and then talk about how much better their new agent was. Sigh it’s all part of the game. But just be wary, those agents who seem unenthusiastic about your property, want the listing all right, they just want it after you’ve taken your lumps and frustration out on some other agent first.