Jay, great post, but helping the empowered real estate consumer interpret the information is where the agent of today and tomorrow can add value to the transaction and earn a commission, not just get paid a side which is another discussion (of course, see divorced commissions, a blog for another day).

I thought it was well taken care of by many wiser than me. And surprise, surprise, many are your friends in Phoenix.

Disintermediation.... wow! What Jay said, that's a great post.

Jay, where's Francy? You changed your pic.

There goes the winner of the first $50.00 me think.  Great post Jay.

Jay, this question has been asked for a couple of years now, and I know the brokers in our area fear the dissemmination of information.  They don't want to be cut out.  One cannot work to their worth when they are running from a shadow of fear.  Don't be what you were, the keeper of the information.  Instead, embrace the future and be the trend setter!!  Be the one that defines the future of our business.

As a  side note, I was a travel agent right when the internet was beginning, the travel industry did fear the new beast, and did not find a way to reinvent itself.  And it has been seriously hurt.  And the consumer did NOT reap any benefit.  Airline tickets did not decrease, the airlines just got to have a larger piece of the pie.  The "savings" of booking yourself, doing all the leg work, trying to research the better fares, etc did not pass on to consumer at all. And as a travel agent I had better, faster access to the same information and could help my clients faster and better... but travel agents have been cut out.

Will that happen in Real Estate?  Not if we define who we are and what we do and deliver in a much larger way.  It will be interesting to see how it goes!!

Shelly

P.S. you get my vote for the $50!!

I think it depends on the individual.  Some people run from technology.  Some people will not need an agent.  Paperwork still has to be done, inspections still have to take place.  Negotiating is a fine art.  

According to statistics selling your home FISBO usually yields the seller less then an agent can achieve .

I do love your posts Jay.  You remind me of my husband.  I go it alone in the photos largley b/c he is so busy.  

Cristina, if you go it alone. Who's the cutie in your pic?

Sure, there are a lot of industries where the middle men got cut out ... but I don't think it will happen in real estate ... we are talking about too much money here ... a lot of personal involvement that needs to happen. Most of us nowadays don't even know what a "travel agent" is ... we go online, book the trip and that's it ... if we make a mistake, well that's our own fault ... we'll learn and hopefully not make the same mistake next time. We may lose couple hundred or thousand dollars but that's about it. But real estate? If someone wants to do it all on his/her own and makes that one small mistake that could be avoided using us, the middlemen ... they can't say, oh, well ... I'll do better next time ... there may be no next time ... they may be in deep trouble! I don't think that most consumers are willing to take the risk and place their futures in the "hands" of the Internet.

I believe a great number of real estate consumers have and will in the future continue to go it alone (thinking they have all the info they need and there is no need to be bothered with one of those horrible real estate agents who are going to sell me a house that I don't want) and the current real estate market is somewhat the result. How many unrepresented buyers walked into builder models, fell in love and left with an affordable payment.

Seller financing (in house mortgage lending) that makes used car dealers look like saints. Loans structured to meet any needs, no doc required, stated income fine, oh, you're  self employed or you can't prove you make enough by your paystubs/tax returns ... making $200,000 per year, no problem, you qualify. Welcome home.  

Fast forward. But I can't make my payment in the second month. Ooops. Wasn't it all explained. Really. Of course it was and here is your initials/signature where we explained everything.

Take a look at Beazer's stock (bzh) today on the market and you have the next enron.

Jay, here are the 5 stars you deserve.

Not quite alone.  That my real estate msacot Hanna.  Her 5 year old brother is a pro at open houses.  He sets up, gets allowance then goes home to wait for his college fund to grow.  He did get a dog out of his last sale.  

A huge thank you to everyone who contributed to REliberation in the month of August! There were a lot