This past week I was having a conversation with an agent who just lost a listing to an agent from another company.  They said I wish the seller knew that over half that agent’s listings expire and never sell.  That statement got me to thinking, that is a great topic to write an article on.  We’ve created the real estate agent expired listings ratio database.

On TV and radio, you hear about all these rating services that want you to contact them as they rate real estate agents by production and sales.  Presumably they want to get in the middle and collect an advertising or referral fee for their service.  Rating agents on sales is one thing, but has anybody ever looked at how many of their listings sell versus expire?

Well, we just did it.  I downloaded 11,280 expired listings in the past year in Lee County from the MLS.  I imported all listings into a sortable database. We searched for expired, terminated, and withdrawn listings as some agents try to skirt the system and withdraw them, so they don’t show as expired.  After running the numbers, we found some astonishing numbers.  One agent had 88 such listings.  Other agents had 76, 69, 52 and so on.  Wouldn’t this be information sellers would want to know about?

We went one step further and created an expired ratio category.  Imagine if you were drafting a basketball team and a guard was available that averages 20 points per game.  Sounds pretty good, that’s roughly 10 field goals per game plus or minus free throws and 3-point shots.  Assuming he or she makes 10 shots per game, would it alarm you to know they took 50 shots per game to make 10?  That would be only a 20% FG%, or put another way, an 80% fail rate.

Therefore, we created the Expired ratio. We know these agents have a ton of listings expire, so let’s look at their expireds compared to their successes.  The agent with 88 expired listings had a 46.81% expired ratio.  Not good!  The agent with 76 expired had a 56.30% expired ratio, even worse.  The worst ratio we saw in the database of top expired agents was 84.21% That’s horrific.  Imagine if you were interviewing agents and they told you over 84% of their listings never sell?

Agents will never tell you this information, and chances are they don’t even know the number.  It’s bad, and they know that, but they don’t know their numbers.  I didn’t until today.  For the record, ours is very good.

I also looked at company data.  Not surprisingly, many of the limited service brokers were high on the list.  Limited service brokers do a lot less, and for that they probably charge less, but who knows?  Sometimes you only get a sign and your listing syndicated to the national data aggregators.  Showing agents may have to contact seller directly to negotiate offers, setup showings, etc.  Showing agents aren’t compensated for the extra work.  It takes extra time and skill to educate both the buyer and seller, negotiate through inspection issues, etc.

I’m not going to publish this list publicly.  We’re not here to put anybody down or call agents out.  We do feel however that sellers should be armed with this information.  It should be part of the decision process.  Sellers are making a large financial decision, and they want honest information in which to evaluate agents in that decision.

If you’re thinking about selling and are interviewing agents, email me Brett@topagent.com with your address and the agents you’re considering and I’ll look them up and let you know how they stack up.  This way, you’ll know if the agent you’re considering has a good track record of actually selling their listings, not just listing them.

You can always call us 239-489-4042 Ext 4.  Ask for Sande or Brett, or visit www.SWFLhomevalues.com to get an idea of what your home is worth for Free!

Good luck and happy selling!

See Last Week’s Article- Blame it on the Marketing