What makes a good broker for a buyer??

beats the hell out of me.

Make the buyer your slave. Dont visit a unit unless the buyer has pre-screened it for you, taken digital photographs, and obtained a good floorplan. Tell the agent about your key criteria, and tell him/her if you're forced to visit inadequate units, you're going to drop him and find another agent with more hustle. On your end, make yourself into an attractive buyer by prequalifying for financing, etc.

A good buyer's broker shows you listings that may not be formally "on the market"; explains to you what comps mean (for example, just because you can get historical numbers doesn't mean you know about the prospect or condition of those units); and negotiates for you by taking into account what's immediately been happening in the market, which you may or may not know because, for example, you may not know what units have been taken into contract in the past month.

Also, a good buyer's broker can help you "see" a property -- more important now that we're in a market where people are not buying off floorplans. My example here is that I sold a loft in SoHo in 2008, and showed it to about a hundred people, and a mere handful (this includes brokers) asked incisive, pertinent questions.

For many people, this is extremely valuable advice to have on a major investment purchase, possibly one of the largest of their lives.

However, if those are services you don't want to pay for (and I suspect that you don't because you asked the question) don't waste an agent's time. Derek's idea about pre-screening, for example, is good in theory, but an agent can't really know their customer's tastes until they go through a few units with them, so in practice a broker can effectively pre-screen only AFTER they've gone through three or four places with you.

ali r.
(downtown broker}

I hated scheduling go-sees. "My" broker happily arranged all that. Broker would feel out selling agent, give me info re: seller's situation. Broker would provide me with info re particular building's boards' reputations, quirks about various buildings' management/history/finances. Broker steered me away from certain buildings. Once knowing my rquirements and tastes, broker could tell me certain properties I wanted to see would not be worth my time. Broker was open and I felt honest and a valuable intermediary during negotiations. Not everyone like negotiating at arms' length--I do. It offers certain advantages and makes available options in terms of how I like to structure a negotiation. My broker was quite good at her role in this. Broker never pushed anything, never implied "time was of the essence" on a property, wasted my time with units clearly outside my price range or not meeting most of my requirements.

Basically, she made the process a lot easier for me, although I still remained extremely engaged and involved in the search.

Hey Kyle, who was your broker?