The cornerstone of real estate is choice
The cornerstone of the real estate industry is the idea of having a choice. Consumers have a choice regarding whether or not they use an agent to buy or sell, who their buyer’s or seller’s agent is, how to find those agents and contract with them and even what that representation agreement looks like. Consumers can choose a brokerage that offers refunds over one that does not, or they can choose a full service brokerage versus a “pay to be in the MLS” model. Listing clients can choose whether or not their home is featured online, in video, in print and the like, and above all, consumers can choose to fire their agent and withdraw from the market if they wish. Consumers can choose what part of the world to live in and can do tremendous amounts of research online before they ever even contact an agent, they can drill down to areas or subdivisions based on their preference in schools, urban versus rural locations, nearby amenities or proximity to work. Then, they can choose the red house over the blue house or the two story over the one story, some have a lender friend they’ve chosen or a title buddy they demand to work with and so on and so forth.
There are a lot of choices to be made in the real estate process and one would think that the endless choices and options offered to consumers like a buffet line would be empowering, but according to the RSAnimate video above, illustrating Professor Renata Salecl’s exploration of limitless choices, this prospect can be paralyzing and full of anxiety leading ultimately to dissatisfaction.
Choices can be paralyzing
According to Dr. Salecl, choice ultimately prevents social change which seems counterintuitive as the very idea of choice is about liberating people, but her analysis as illustrated above is logical, especially in America where we are so drawn into ourselves that we implode at the mere concept of organizing for social change.
Granted, the above video is borderline propaganda for unions, we encourage you to take a look at it from a different perspective and that is that consumer choice is a part of our society and while we are all hopping on to Twitter to be present as they make those choices, part of being a trusted advisor is taking the stress out of those choices.
A wise Realtor and my mentor used to say to clients at the onset of their transaction, “this process is going to look extremely easy, and that is how you know I’m doing my job well.”
