Listing Your Home With Flat Fee MLS Saves You Thousands in Real Estate Commissions

Until recently, real estate commission was calculated strictly as a percentage of the sale price of a home. A real estate agent earned commission at a typical rate of five to six percent of that sale price; some would argue that that is too much for too little work. One could agree with that assessment, particularly in sales transactions that go smoothly from start to finish and require very little effort on the part of the agent.
However, homeowners now have an alternative. Real estate commission (at least from the sale side of the transaction) can be eliminated from the equation through the use of the Flat Fee Multiple Listing Service when selling your home. For a flat fee, you will have your home listed through the Multiple Listing Service, and hundreds of other websites around the country, for maximum exposure. You may not realize that many real estate agents limit the amount of Internet exposure they give your home in order to increase their chances of earning the sale commission. With Flat Fee Multiple Listing Service, you will have access to all the marketing tools that traditionally were reserved for agents alone without having to pay thousands of dollars in real estate commission at time of closing. You will have to pay real estate commission to a buyers broker if the purchasers use an agent to find your home, but that is still a fraction of the real estate commission for which you would have been responsible by hiring an agent of your own.
By allowing you to hang out your own For Sale By Owner sign, the Flat Fee Multiple Listing Service grants you the potential of attracting even more buyer traffic to your door, as many prospective purchasers will be more eager to deal directly with you and not through a broker. Attracting a buyer in this manner saves you even more in real estate commission in that there will be no buyers broker commission to pay, either. You can potentially save yourself thousands of dollars. Of course, you will also run the risk of alienating some brokers who may be reluctant to bring buyers to you for that very reason, but using the flat fee system to avoid real estate commission is well worth it.
Using the Flat Fee Multiple Listing Service does not mean that your transaction will be 100 percent broker free. Only a licensed broker who belongs to the Multiple Listing Service can list a home through the service. With Flat Fee, you will be assigned to a licensed broker who will monitor your listing and act as your point of contact. That broker will be ultimately responsible for maintaining the accuracy of your listing and for keeping it current.

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