111–120 of 346 posts
About 10 years ago, me and my wife took LSD on a vacation, and the sheer uselessness of a real estate agent appeared to us. What does a real estate agent do? They unlock doors. Who are real estate agents? We can all think of a few real estate agents, none of them are top performers. They are usually on their ~4th career before the age of 30. They are the type of person to wear a suit in public to pretend that it make…
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> I think you highly under-estimate the sales skills and other life competencies required to be in a high pressure sales job like being a real estate agent. Also, be really good looking.
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That isnt being a real estate agent, that is buying/selling the market.
Ok I’ll rephrase: We software engineers tried to buy/sell houses using algorithms, and failed to the tune of $550m. I think we collectively would have similar success (or lack thereof) as actual real estate agents.
About 10 years ago, me and my wife took LSD on a vacation, and the sheer uselessness of a real estate agent appeared to us. What does a real estate agent do? They unlock doors. Who are real estate agents? We can all think of a few real estate agents, none of them are top performers. They are usually on their ~4th career before the age of 30. They are the type of person to wear a suit in public to pretend that it make…
I wouldn't go quite that far. They also handle the paperwork and coordination with the other agent, which is not a trivial job. It's highly questionable if the value they add is worth 5% of the gross sale price of the house, especially in our amazingly inflated markets, but few if any agents seem interested in working at hourly rates.
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Yes, and even if you are a “top performer” doing gods work… that does not give you any right to belittle others. I wholeheartedly agree with this sentiment and would pay money to see us as a collective (me included) try our hand at something like real estate. I for one know I would fail, but that’s me.
We software engineers already have tried, and failed to the tune of $550 million. Oops. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29087479
Interview with the author https://www.digitalesbild.gwi.uni-muenchen.de/inexplicably-b... "KP: Is it important for you that the photos actually originate from real estate marketplaces? If so, how do you verify their origin? AD: Yes, that’s actually really important, otherwise the blog is just unverifiable user-generated content. If an image is submitted without a link, or no agent’s logo on the image, or I can’t find…
This is incredible given some of the listings. The fact one of the pictures is the house on literal fire, coupled with this context, goes to show that some people really don't belong anywhere in marketing or sales.
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Not exactly real estate agents for buying/selling but related: I remember reading about the fact that, at the time, most apartments in NYC were "broker only" (aka you can only see and then rent an apartment if you are using a licensed real estate broker). The more I thought about this, I started to see the benefits for both sides: - for the landlord: the broker acts as a filter for people who are serious vs "looky lo…
The problem with brokers is that they can charge 1-2 months rent. That means you can easily be left with a 8k bill for moving into a new apartment. The job literally could not exist anywhere else because no one would pay it. But they aren't making any more land in Manhattan and they aren't building subway lines quick enough so landlords get to pass that expense off to tenants