yes.

You're penalizing her for producing a buyer for your property.

If she, rather than agent XYZ, produces a buyer for your property, why would you not be happy to pay her what you'd have paid XYZ?

I commonly make the provision to reduce the commission if my LA brings the buyer. I've never had an agent complain.
If you are not comfortable with the dual agent, now is the time to decide.

Sylviatexas is right. She would sell her buyer a different property and make twice the money (1/2 from listing yours, and 1/2 from selling another). Why would she give up an entire buying side commission? And her buyer might pay more for your house than another buyer would. Get all the buyers you can into the house and increase the competition for it to get the highest price.

I would not reduce the commission by 50%. If 6% is custom in your area, suggest 4%
My agent would sell my house because it is the right house for the buyer. The buyer knows the market and knows my house is the best fit.
The buyer called my agent directly from my sign, asking to view my house.

If you reduce your agents commission you put other agents who may bring a buyer at a disadvantage. If you have 2 offers come in at the same time, one from your agent and one from another agent you could create an unfair advantage for the buyers your agent brings.

I have had agents who didn't want to show properties if the seller had a reduced commission if their agent brought the buyer.

Something to think about.

Harley Rider
to your first statement as a seller, who cares? This isn't about fair, this is about the best net for me, the seller.

to your second, how would they find out? Its pretty customary in my area, I doubt its on MLS like that.

Multiple listing rules try to discourage these sorts of unfair advantages. In my area, it is required to disclose on the listing form whether there is a dual commission arrangement, as you are describing above. Uneducated sellers tend not to see the big picture. They think reducing a commission means they are going to net more on their house. Commission means a percentage of something. The something is what matters; what the seller nets is what is important. So every possible buyer should get into the house to increase the competiion. Wait to the end to cut if it is necessary. It may not be.

When I sold a home 5 years ago, my agent did turn out to be the buyer's agent also. (Previous to this there had been 4 purchase contracts which had fallen through). I had not been given any papers to sign regarding this possibility and I had not even thought about it when I listed the house.

I think that you would want to give your realtor all incentives possible. It isn't very likely that your listing agent will become the buyer's agent too. But at least if it does happen, you will know that the buyer is serious and able to complete the purchase, because the agent will have more knowledge of the buyer and the buyer's intentions.
It's tough to sell homes today, I wouldn't worry about the dual agency issue.
When it happened to me, I was not happy with my realtor due to some previous problems with the process. So when he tried to have me make concessions, I said no (I was planning on ending his listing as soon as it expired). Well, he certainly had incentives to keep the buyer in the process and he did that very well.
Try to emotionally distance yourself from the selling process (easy to say, hard to do) and just try to give the agent as many incentives as possible to get the house sold.
Good luck]
Susan

A dual agents legal liability is much higher and more problematic than a buyers agent or transaction broker, that's why many states have outlawed this practice.
Doing dual agency in itself warrants a higher commission to cover the risk IMO.

Here is a link that might be useful: Dual Agency

We asked for a reduction and got it. The agent said what Sylvia said, but we said we weren't that comfortable with it and we wouldn't feel like we were fully represented in such a case so we should get compensation for that. We weren't greedy though and got it at 5%. This would in our case cover the extra attorney fees would the case have occured. Basically still get the 3% for her buyer's agent part and compensating us by 1% for the reduced representation we percieved and getting 2% for the selling part.

As it was we just closed on the property this week and the buyers agent was even from a separate agency.

How did you close on a property prior to Jan. 16, when you were not even listed on Jan. 6th? If this did happen, your agent probably did deserve the full compensation.

ncrealestateguy - was that to me as I don't see anybody else mentioning a closing.

Not sure where you get not even listed on Jan 6th from. How do you know when we listed or not? The property in question was listed for about 18 months.

I met with an agent yesterday who said, without my asking, that he would reduce his commission from 5% to 4% if he brought it a buyer while he had the listing on my house. He said his partner would represent the buyer and he would continue to represent me (the seller).

I think times have changed for agents, at least in my area. When I bought my house 6 years ago, most agents asked for and received 7%. Very few were willing to discount, at least at the time the listing agreement was signed. The landscape is different now.

chrisk327 said;

"Harley Rider
to your first statement as a seller, who cares? This isn't about fair, this is about the best net for me, the seller.
to your second, how would they find out? Its pretty customary in my area, I doubt its on MLS like that."

The seller should care because it reduces the agents who may bring a buyer into the game. If they think I have a buyer who has an unfair advantage they may balk.

For the second part, I get asked that regularly. I'm in a unique area and do most of the sales ... both listing and selling side.

This very scenario has happened to me.

KC

If you reduce your agents commission you put other agents who may bring a buyer at a disadvantage. If you have 2 offers come in at the same time, one from your agent and one from another agent you could create an unfair advantage for the buyers your agent brings.

I have had agents who didn't want to show properties if the seller had a reduced commission if their agent brought the buyer.

Something to think about.

I must not be reading this correctly. How does reducing the dual agent's commission create a disadvantage to other agents?
Are you saying if the dual agent got full commission it is less of an advantage for the dual agent?
Are you saying an agent will refuse to show their buyer a house if the LA has agreed to a reduced commission that is unacceptable to another agent?
I don't see the unfair or disadvantage you are suggesting?

The seller nets more with their agent's commission cut, so the other buyer has to pay more to make up for that.

Unless all Agents are standing united against this practice this whole discussion is silly.

I'm the seller, I am paying the agent. The agent will make more money if they bring in a buyer on their own listing. a reduced commission rate just means that they are getting more, but not double their normal comp.

As a seller, I personally don't care if the other buyers would have to give more for an equal net. Also, I have not seen any thought of this from an agent's perspective when showing homes. They will look at how much is offered to them.

I live in a suburb of NYC, its not all that large. However, there are currently more than 200 "agents" in just my town alone, which boarders 3 other towns which each have plenty of agents. the chance of my agent being the one to sell my home is pretty small.

"a reduced commission rate just means that they are getting more, but not double their normal comp."

insane.

Reducing a paycheck *never* results in "more", & getting paid one's full fee is not "double their normal comp".

Handling a listing is 1/2 of the fee;
handling a buyer is 1/2 of the fee.

1/2 + 1/2 + 1, not 2.

That should be

1/2 + 1/2 = 1, not 2.

sylviatexas, I understand your basic math, but as chrisk327 said, if he wants to offer that and his agent accepts it, what is the problem for him?
Have you had other agents ask you what your commission split is with your client?
I still don't see how all this matters when an offer comes in. Yes, I know the math, but there are so many other variables to an offer, it is not all the about the bid price.

The only issue I was addressing was math, which is not insignificant.

but no, agents do not (in my experience anyway) ask the listing agent what fee has been charaged.

The only thing a buyer's agent, or a buyer, is interested in is the fee to be paid to the buyer's agent.

As to contract offers coming in, the only variables to be considered then are the terms of the offer to purchase.

The Realtor fee has been set in the listing contract between seller & Realtor;
the purchase contract is between seller & buyer.

It does matter. It matters to the buyers, and here is why.
If a buyer that is a client of the listing agent makes an offer of $100,000, and the commission is a reduced 4%, the net amount to the seller is $96,000. If another buyer gets into a multiple situation with this other buyer, his $100,000 offer nets the seller $94,000. ($100,000 - 6% = $6000). If the second buyer has no idea that the other agent is on a variable commission, then they are at an unfair advantage.
I beleive all MLS's mandate that if the seller is offering a commission to the cooperating agent that is higher than the listing agent, it has to be disclosed, so all parties start the negotiations on a level playing field.
It's as simple as that. It has nothing to do with the agents, it has to do with the two buyers.

ncrealestateguy, you are making my point why I as a buyer, go direct with the LA.

I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree. I'm not sure how to argue "insane!" as it appears to be industry practice by me. I could equally argue that an agent's commission shouldn't be based upon the sale price of the house as it is really no different in the amount of marketing between selling at 300K vs 400K vs 450K, but again its industry practice so why bother.

In my area, lets say a normal listing is 5%, with 2.5 going to the LA and 2.5 to BA. if the listing agent brings in the buyer, they normally will reduce to 4%.

So if they sell it themselves, they get 4%, if they don't they get 2.5%. I'm not a RE agent, but I'm sure its not double the work if they are acting as duel agents, especially if its from someone calling off a sign etc.

Again, it may matter to the buyer, but as a seller its not really my problem, even if the net were equal there is a definate incentive to both the seller and the LA to sell to the LA buyer. More transparancy to the buyers, easier situation to control etc..

ncrealestateguy is correct of course.

I was thinking in terms of a buyer's agent calling me & asking what commission I was charging rather than in terms of variable commission, which must be disclosed in MLS listings.

I think that as the seller you may have more leverage on this issue if and when this dual agency situation might occur. It did happen in my case (although there had not been any mention of it when I signed the listing agreement).

In my case, I was doubtful that the listing agent would actually get this deal to close (because there had been 4 previous failures), so I basically made few concessions and stood firm on the price. He did try to talk me into lowering price, but I didn't. So he really did have to earn that double commission by selling this deal to his other client, the buyer. The deal did close and in hindsight, I was extremely lucky it did before the big fall in home values in Los Angeles.

Good luck
Susan

Thank you for all the advice and opinions!

Berniak's link was very helpful in explaining a dual agency.

We have an appointment this evening with another agent, whom we intend to list with. He will showing us his marketing plan/strategy.

His commission is 5% in this price range and today's market conditions. It is 4% if he also brings the buyer.

Thank you again!