Mr. Tom Early. A leading rabble rouser in the real estate industry. In person. In the flesh.
One of the treats of attending the NAREE conference in Charlotte was having the chance to meet Tom Early, Master CEBA president of the National Assn. of Exclusive Buyer Agents, and broker of Buyers Brokerage in Columbus, OH. Tom is a frequent contributor to the RealTalk list serv He is a strong proponent of single agency real estate practice and champions the cause frequently.
Here are some nuggets from the RealTalk archives:
On understanding fiduciary: "The days of listing brokers ruling REALTORDOM are over, big time, never to be seen again. It is time to wake up and understand that their are TWO parties to the sale and there are TWO brokers doing business, legally, trying to land the buyer. Let the big boys have there way and there will be nothing but big boys doing business."
On banks in real estate: "I say it is hypocritical for Realtors to be in the lending business, title business, inspection business, home warranty business, etc. etc., and tell everyone else that they can't be in the Real Estate Business. It's called guarding your own turf, folks."
On giving back: "Spent last night unloading trucks ( I can handle a fork lift) for our local down town food shelter and will be dishing out food on Christmas day at the same facility. NOTHING, not even a good sharp discussion on AGENCY, makes me feel better than helping those who either can not or will not help themselves. That feeling is the REAL feeling of Christmas and or Happy Holidays. Give till it feels good."
On the matter of contracts: "While your board has a right to make any rule it wishes, I would challenge any rule which told a buyer what they could or could not negotiate in THEIR contract with the seller...While NAR through it's state association and then trickled down to the local level tried very hard to put EBA out of business many years ago with tactics like this it did not work.
"The seller has every right to tell this buyer to go take a hike and if I were advising the seller that is the advice they would get from me...If a buyer wants to ask the seller to pay toward their buyer broker fee the buyer has EVERY right to do so and [the local] board has NOTHING to say about it. Now there may be a few listing agents who are stupid enough to advise their seller not to do so based only on the fact that the listing agents doesn't like to see things done that way, but what the hell, stupid people are either born that way or they take pills. When I see listing brokers attempt to tell me that I am worth only what they offer in the MLS and I have nothing to say about it methinks they were either born stupid, take pills, or forgot to take their pills."
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