Buying or selling real property (including a business) often requires a team of professionals to provide advice and assistance to help you achieve your goals. Your team might include a representative from your financial institution, a mortgage broker or specialist, an appraiser, property inspector, lawyer, stager, design consultant and other experts or service providers. Your team should also include a REALTOR®.
REALTORS® are a specific kind of real estate professional. REALTORS® are members of a local real estate association – locally, that is the REALTORS® Association of Hamilton-Burlington, or RAHB – and members of the Ontario Real Estate Association and Canadian Real Estate Association.
REALTORS® are trained real estate professionals. They complete the requirements of the provincial licensing course and REALTORS® continue to upgrade their knowledge and skills through continuing education. Courses on everything from how to recognize a former grow-op, residential tenancies, solar energy and Feng Shui help REALTORS® help you when it is time to buy or sell a property.
REALTORS® are skilled real estate professionals. Skills such as marketing your property in the right place at the right time, screening and qualifying potential buyers and negotiating on your behalf at a time when emotions can run high are just some of the skills a REALTOR® brings to the table.
REALTORS® are knowledgeable real estate professionals. Their job is to know the real estate market – what buyers are looking for, what makes a home more saleable, what areas are hot, what areas are up-and-coming – and use that knowledge to your benefit. REALTORS® also know about easements and encroachments, sewage systems, zoning bylaws and other factors that could affect the purchase or sale of your property.
REALTORS® are ethical real estate professionals. They are bound by a Code of Ethics written into provincial licensing legislation and a strict Code of Ethics and Standards of Business Practice as part of their membership in RAHB and CREA. You can be sure your REALTOR® is performing to the highest ethical standards and is answerable to the Real Estate Council of Ontario or the REALTORS® Association of Hamilton-Burlington for any conduct that fails to meet the standards set.
REALTORS® have access to the Multiple Listing Service®, or MLS® system, a database of properties listed for sale or lease by other members of RAHB. When you list a property for sale with a REALTOR, the detailed marketing information is available to all 2500 members of the REALTORS® Association of Hamilton-Burlington. They will inform their clients about your property, and your property is exposed to the many buyers seeking properties like yours.
When you are buying a property, your REALTOR® uses the MLS® system to search for properties which meet your criteria and then keeps you informed as new properties come on the market. Your REALTOR®, acting in your interests, will know how to interpret the information and can offer insight about the property and how it compares to other properties that also meet your needs.
REALTORS® brings integrity, knowledge, skills and the right tools to the buying or selling process. Make sure a REALTOR® is a member of your team.
Cameron Nolan
President, 2012