REM Online

A sur­vey of Royal LeP­age sales­peo­ple and bro­kers says that 86% of real estate pro­fes­sion­als worry that severe dereg­u­la­tion in the real estate indus­try would erode stan­dards of cus­tomer ser­vice for Cana­di­ans who are buy­ing or sell­ing a home. The online poll of 1,726 Real­tors by Royal LeP­age says that pro­posed changes to the Mul­ti­ple List­ing Ser­vice will do lit­tle to improve an already com­pet­i­tive industry.

In the sur­vey, Real­tors were asked to com­ment on the poten­tial impact of ‘unbundling’ real estate ser­vices and lim­it­ing the extent to which accred­ited real estate pro­fes­sion­als man­age the MLS sys­tem. Eighty-six% of agents sur­veyed said they are “con­cerned that the push to fos­ter increased com­pe­ti­tion in the indus­try will result in lower cus­tomer ser­vice stan­dards.” When asked about the state of the mar­ket­place cur­rently, 76% of respon­dents said the indus­try is “highly competitive.”

“Our com­pany was founded on prin­ci­ples of client ser­vice and con­sumer pro­tec­tion. Our agents wel­come com­pe­ti­tion in the indus­try, but are very con­cerned that the severe dereg­u­la­tion of the res­i­den­tial real estate bro­ker­age indus­try would hurt, not help, Cana­dian home buy­ers and sell­ers,” says Phil Soper, pres­i­dent and chief exec­u­tive, Royal LeP­age. “To state that there is a lack of com­pe­ti­tion in the Cana­dian real estate indus­try is sim­ply incor­rect.  Every day, the 100,000 men and women in the pro­fes­sion com­pete vig­or­ously with each other and with unli­censed, unreg­u­lated alter­na­tives. The range of ser­vices avail­able from licensed Real­tors is vast, with fees on the low end that extend down­ward to a small frac­tion of one% of a home’s sale price.”

When asked how often they help clients avoid finan­cial or trans­ac­tional mis­takes, more than 88% of Real­tors sur­veyed said “very often” or “often.” The poll also found that real estate agents’ pri­mary con­sid­er­a­tion when advis­ing clients is to opti­mize and pro­tect clients’ finan­cial well-being, says Royal LePage.

“Enter­ing into a real estate trans­ac­tion is often the largest finan­cial deci­sion a per­son or fam­ily will make, and gov­ern­ment reg­u­la­tors and we in the pro­fes­sion have a respon­si­bil­ity to Cana­di­ans to ensure that the mar­ket­place has proper safe­guards in place,” Soper says. “The crit­i­cal ele­ments in main­tain­ing a fair and effi­cient real estate mar­ket include the need to ensure Real­tors meet eth­i­cal and edu­ca­tional stan­dards, to pro­tect our clients’ sen­si­tive per­sonal data, and to ensure the integrity of list­ings information.”

While almost all advi­sors sur­veyed use the MLS sys­tem (98%), they com­monly use other tools to pro­mote list­ings, includ­ing an open house (90%), news­pa­per adver­tis­ing (89%), and their web­site (87%).

“We sur­veyed our agents’ opin­ions on these impor­tant issues because we feel it’s crit­i­cal for those in the pro­fes­sion – real estate pro­fes­sion­als from across Canada work­ing with home buy­ers and sell­ers every day – to have a voice in this mat­ter,” says Soper.

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