Talk:Real estate agent/Archives/2012

25-Jan-07 - Removal of most of the article: an act of annoymous vandalism?
I have to assume to and have reverted. Viva-Verdi 00:01, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

American predominanace?
No disputing USA is important, and more importantly on the internet, as most writers are from there, but is not there a perceived American predominance in this article, as in numerous others? Of course this does not fall under NPOV, but then given Wikipedia purports to be an universal encyclopaedia, or as the mission of Wikipedia says that it wants to give information to everyone including an African child, how does such specific information (which is excellent in itself) help in a generic sense? Just wondering if something could be done about it, and if yes, what?

How this info. helps in a generic since...
If the information provided is acurate, which it is, then it helps in the since that: for someone inquireing about the specifics of broker functionality for example, it is available. As far as American Predominance is concerned i did not feel that was the case. However if it was would it be so false. would you say America is the dominate nation in the world?

Well, the US has a predominance because the economy in this market shows that we have a superior way of doing business. You wouldn't necessarily want to teach someone a stone age way of negotiating a real estate deal as is done in many other pre-historic countries.

Revisions to this article
I have made considerable revisions to this article today based on the need to clarify and expand several aspects of the laws of real estate brokerage.

In particular, the notion of a fiduciary relationship with buyers (aka Buyer brokerage; Buyer agency; Buyer representation), treating them as clients not as "customers" (an old fashioned term where many agents act as Buyers' reps), needed to be addressed.

For the record, I spent about 20 years in real estate, was licenced in two Eastern states, and have bought property in a third (in the West). I was assistant manager, manager, and then co-owner of a brokerage, as well as listing and selling $6 to $14 million in real estate annually. I held CRS, GRI, ePro, and ABR designations.

Vivaverdi 22:19, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Revision of Dual Agency section
Re: DUAL AGENCY: I think that the person who made these changes needs to be clearer on the notion of representation.

Dual Agency = representation of both parties accordng to various state laws.

Transaction brokerage = no AGENCY relationship.

These edits needs revising. Vivaverdi 05:17, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Appropriate external links
Many of the editors of real estate articles (e.g. see Flat fee mls]]) have agreed that purely commercial external links to providers of real estate services have no place on a Wikipedia article.

Consequently, as these links appear, they have been removed. I SUPPORT SUCH REMOVAL. Please add your comments here. Vivaverdi 23:28, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I wish you the best of luck in trying to stop people from Wikipedia Blogging as it were...


 * Well, it's a non-stop process. Luckilly, there are enough astute editors who have this article on the list of "watchlist" articles, so that none of this nonsense stays on the article very long......


 * Of course, it does raise an interesting question about registration, anonimity, etc. re: Wikipedia policy. I'd certanly like to see some changes....  Vivaverdi 00:47, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Merge with Estate agent
I think this article should be merged with Estate agent. They are essentially the same thing; it's the person you go to when you want to sell your house and buy a new one, it's just a different name used in different locations. Yes the specific roles are slightly different, but only because laws and conventions are different in the places where the name is different. IT'S THE SAME JOB.

Also, please don't delete the merge template without allowing time for due discussion.

Abc30 13:32, 5 September 2006 (UTC)


 * I DISAGREE.
 * This article relates to a specfic US approach to selling property. In the US, brokers (and their agents) are licenced under individual state laws and have a variety of fiduciary relationships with their clients (see various agency relationships as explained in the article).
 * I do not believe that there is any kind of licencing in the UK and that the role played by the "estate agent" is very different (and they are paid differently too.)


 * There is too much in THIS article which relates to the US only, and too much in the ESTATE AGENT article which relates to UK practice.


 * PS: fyi - I'm British and have owned propery in the UK and now in the US for 35 years. I was a Realtor for 20 years in Maryland. Vivaverdi 14:38, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

See comments in Talk:Estate agent re: agreement NOT TO MERGE. Merge tag removed. Vivaverdi 19:20, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Real Estate Education section REMOVED
WHY? Firstly, it is all mostly copied direcly from the Calif. REC website.

Secondly, a whole section devoted to real estate in CA is hardly necessary in a general article on real estate brokerage.

While there may be some value in having a section devoted to real estate education, it certainly does not need to be as specific as this and apply only to one state. Each state has slightly different requirements for obtaining a salesperson's and broker's licence, but there are probably some overlaps.

'''Anyone want to write it? COMMENTS PLEASE.''' Vivaverdi 14:49, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Editing this article and editors' qualifications.
It would be nice if people who radically change existing sections of this page both REGISTER and declare their qualifications to do so.

There is too much rambling nonsense being written here, and it makes little sense. Recently, one unregistered individual became so confused that he/she thought that a real estate brokerage was an "Agency" when the section in question was dealing with "Agency relationships" between brokers and sellers/buyers....

For the record: I have been a real estate AGENT, office mananger, office owner, etc. in Maryland for 20 years, and for most of that time involved with my local Association of Realtors committees.

Vivaverdi 01:36, 21 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Qualifications are unimportant and registration is unimportant. It's references and verifiability that are important. -- zzuuzz (talk) 01:46, 21 November 2006 (UTC)


 * It's certainly true that refs and verifiability are important. In fact, WP:CITE, WP:VER, and WP:EL can be a serious contributor's best friend. It is totally in keeping with policy to revert unsourced assertions with an appropriate Edit Summary, ie "rv unsourced assertions pending a verifiable citation". Likewise, a summary of "rv linkspam per WP:EL" is more than sufficient to deal with the spam that will inevitably crop up in an article like this. It can be frustrating Vivaverdi, having to revisit the same drek every day, I deal with it in certain articles too. Just try to keep in mind the some really bad editing gets done by well-meaning newbies; we want to encourage better editing without biting anyone. And if you find yourself getting stressed, just take a break from the keyboard and have a nice cup of tea. What you put in the tea (purely for medicinal purposes) is entirely up to you :) --Doc Tropics Message in a bottle 04:19, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Globalization issues
A very long paragraph relating to globalization was recently added to the opening paragraphs of this article. It also included a section on the CRS designation.

I have moved the bulk of the paragraph to the bottom of the article, since its purpose is to define the scope of a typical real estate broker (and broker's agents) functions and activities. Involvement in global activity is important, but it does not deserve a place of such prominence.

Also, the author of the paragraph, who may be from New Mexico (as am I), included the names of five or six specific real estate agents who hold the CIPS designation and speak more languages than English. This is NOT APPROPRIATE for this - or any other - kind of article.

The National Association of Realtors article needs more on NAR-approved designations, including CIPS, CRS, and ABR + others.

Vivaverdi 17:51, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

??Article needing to be made more global in its approach??

 * I have made some changes to reflect that this article is very US specific. To my knowledge, it is not a term used elswhere; if I'm wrong please correct me... OKOKOK foshoo...


 * But it hardly seems valid to insist that this be more global in approach when the practice of and the use of the term, "real estate broker", is so localized. If we try to describe r.e. practice in every country, and still use this name for the article, it would be enormous -and move way beyond the term.


 * If someone wants to write separate articles on different r.e. practices in other coountries (actually Estate agent exists), then they could be linked from here.


 * Viva-Verdi (talk) 19:03, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.231.227.185 (talk) 21:14, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

I dont agree that the term "real estate broker" is localized. Maybe there are some differences between countries like the ones mentioned, like "estate agent" in the UK, but real estate broker seems like a universal way of describing "in english" those who are involved in the real estate brokerage industry. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ldominguez (talk • contribs) 01:08, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Removal Request Due to Perceived Unfactual Findings
I'm writing this in regards to the factual statement being made that "In most jurisdictions in the United States, a person is required to have a license in order to receive remuneration for services rendered as a real estate broker." My reason for exploiting this is due to the fact that I have not yet found any jurisdiction in the United States where a person is not required to have a license in order to receive remuneration for services rendered as a real estate broker. I would like this statement to either be removed or exemplified by stating which States are in fact the exception. My purpose for this request is for the purpose of clarity, and hence reassuring that the statement being made is in fact factual.

--VivaVerdi and anyone else please respond to this comment with reasoning to either keep the statement or have it removed--

JZOR - June 7, 2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.231.227.185 (talk) 21:48, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * At first I thought that we were talking about the removal of the entire article! A little extreme!


 * Anyway, this editor may well be right. I DO NOT KNOW. My expereince only relates to the several states/jurisdictions for which I have real estate knowledge and expereince such as MD,VA,DE,NY,DC,CA,NM, CO. I wonder whether there is a a source which could support or refute the statement, since it is logicals to assume that ALL states would require licencing.


 * Anyone know about LA, with its French legal tradition?


 * I'll try to find something to support this being a US-wide (and Candian-wide) requirement. Viva-Verdi (talk) 03:46, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

earth has more then 200 countries, why give even more focus to USA?????? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.137.47.114 (talk) 18:10, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Highy biased and narrowly focused, filled with WP:OR
This is one of the worst articles I've come across in a while, filled with personal observations and opinions, narrowly focused on residential sales transactions and biased towards residential brokers and agents. I've started tagging and made some improvements but there is a ton of work to be done here to clean up this mess. Toddst1 (talk) 20:22, 3 September 2012 (UTC)