Eugene, Oregon: There will be big changes to how homes are bought and sold in Oregon starting in August. The new rules could make it cheaper to buy a home.
Jeremy Starr, Principal Realtor at Berkshire Hathaway House Services and 2006 Oregon Realtor President said that these new rules can be hard to understand at first for people who are trying to buy a house. This is why they want to stress three important points. RMLS, the biggest realtor-owned multiple listing service in the Oregon-Washington area, agreed to the changes and new rules as part of a national settlement that will affect how homes are bought and sold across the country.
He said, “The first part is that, for you to show a property to a buyer in the multiple listing service, that buyer must sign a buyer broker contract.”
Before the settlement, people who wanted to buy a house would see not only the price of the house but also the fee paid to the buyer’s broker. This means that a person selling their home was ready to pay a buyer’s broker a fee to help them find a qualified buyer. The broker fee is no longer part of the home’s price after the settlement.
He added, “The multiple listing service is how we advertise properties for sale, whether you see it on Zillow, Red Fin, Realtor dot com, it all originates in the multiple listing service.”
He also said that the new rules might make it harder for people who want to buy a house.
He stated, “One they have to agree to how a Buyer’s Broker will have to be compensated, whether they pay for it, or there’s a concession that can be allowed from the seller, decoupled from the listing but still allowed.”
As Starr put it, most buyers are fine with paying a buyer’s broker to bring them a good buyer. You can still do that, but it can’t be promoted or listed, so the buyer may have to pay their broker.
He added, “A lot of buyers especially in the lower price range don’t have the funds available to compensate for a Buyer’s Broker.”
The buyer must have a broker when discussing the price of a home under the new national rules. For the past two years, that’s been the case in Oregon. Today, though, the buyer can choose to work with the seller’s broker instead.
He told them, “You don’t want to be a buyer whose broker is the seller.” It’s allowed to do that, but I don’t think it’s in the best interest of the buyer to not have their lawyer.
They think that the new rules will make people respect skilled Buyer’s Brokers even more.
Starr added, “I think for the first time Buyer’s Broker are going to have to have a strong skill set and articulate their value, they’re going to have to bring their value to the buyer and articulate it to them, so they understand it and are willing to sign that Buyer Broker contract.”