Do really brokers know their product?

Thousands of brokers some good some bad, like any other business

if you don't find value, then don't use one. if you are going to use one, get one by referral.

So far I had nothing against using a broker and the one I am dealing with seems to be prepared, but apparently brokers have access to some listings days or even weeks before they are posted on SE and that is not really efficient.

I apologize, I wanted to say.. weeks AFTER they are posted on SE..

efficient for whom?

Through Streeteasy, I've found that I see new listings before my (now former) agent emails me about them.

David
There are plenty of brokes that will pack your in box with possibilities.
Just get a different broker or shop for yourself and utilize the broker for final advice and sale facilitation.
You can do both. If you're hot to buy there's brokers that will tackle you, as long as you're not market delusional.

the reason is because major firms provide SE with a private data feed - the reasoning being that the sellers of the excl listings at these firms demand accurate and fast updates on major aggregator sites like SE. Your broker likely uses a sharing system vendor to connect them to the industry's internal status updates (i.e., olr, realplus, etc). By pure mechanics of the distribution mechanism, your likely to see the update faster here than through a shared system.

I guess you need to ask yourself what the role of the broker should be to best meet your needs. Is it speed of seeing a new listing? The valuation process of a target property, once identified. For hand holding and guidance throughout a mysterious buying process? Etc. Most needs for a broker may not be too impacted by the speed of which new information is received and analyzed. Most of our buyer clients prefer the services after the target unit is discovered, not necessarily the speed with which we get the information.

A broker's value is is in knowing how to source property, and deliver it to buyers at the highest price possible without taking too long to the transaction done. When one asks if brokers know their product, be careful to distinguish what product you are discussing, the real estate or the market participants. I imagine brokers would publicly tout the former, but in reality admit it is the latter.

I thought the OP was discussing buy side. Sell side certainly would expect brokers to know how to "source property and deliver it to buyers at the highest price possible without taking too long to the transaction done".

Buyers need to understand that all to often THEY ARE THE PRODUCT.

yes, but that can be said of any transaction then

- urbandigs: this particular listing has been 15 days on market in StreetEasy and the broker still hasn't it. It takes me a lot of time comparing what is really on the market (or on SE) and what my broker has access to through the software that he's using.

- jim_hones10: the main reason I am using a broker it to save time, I am able to make my own offer and I don't need him other than for scheduling appointments and sending me everything that fits my search. He can do the first thing but he cannot be very efficient, or it's difficult for me to believe that he is, into offering me all the available product. At the same time I don't know if this is his "fault", I am starting to think that is how the system works, so I better just look by myself.

Like ticket scalpers. No interest and no money. But they got on line first cause they don't have a real job and got nothing to do.

At least scalpers inventory what they sell.

It's possible the broker didn't show you a place because of the lack of potential commission.

d87 -- i cant say im shocked, because I data mined the RLS (rebny listing service) status updates from 2006-2010 and found 100s of issues involving data integrity, latency, completeness, etc. However, the first thing that comes to mind is whether the firm that is exclusively marketing the listing is a REBNY member firm? Is it? If its a big name, your assured it is. But if its not, then your broker will NOT see this listing or the status updates in their internal sharing systems. Only rebny member firm listings are shared.

If they r a rebny member firm and the listing is not shared, then its a question of who the vendor is (olr, realplus, realtymx, etc) and why the listing got lost in the rolex distribution hub.

urbandigs: look for example at the Philip House in the UES..

all seem to be shared and avail on my internal systems...so unless I know what vendor/front end your broker uses to connect to rls, wont be able to help further

btw, the data problem works the other way too: I see things on my computer system that never make it over to streeteasy.

However, it's a fact that marketers of new development are often a little, um, slow to release into the rolex distribution hub. During the boom, I would pretty much take it as a sign that a building was "over" when it actually started getting formal updating there.

That doesn't mean, however, that your broker can't keep up by using other information sources. Curbed, for example, will do articles like this one:

http://ny.curbed.com/archives/2012/10/09/secretive_200_east_79th_street_now_officially_on_the_market.php

Since buildings don't get constructed in 15 days, maybe you two should sit down and just talk through all the new condo buildings in your target area so you don't feel like you're missing anything.

ali r.
DG Neary Realty

right, thats def a vendor issue then.

my broker is using "OLR", in any case he's a good guy and I have told him about the listing, but the problem remains. Once I told him about this building the apartment that I was interested into had a contract out already. I understand that there could be some technical problem from time to time, but what front_porch is suggesting seems more an industry behavior. As a customer I am just looking to get access to all the listing from the same source and so far SE seems to be doing the same job, if not a better job when it comes to new listings than a broker.

yes, private data feeds will send over info faster and more complete than distribution-based sharing systems. Complete and timely shared data is no longer a broker's only advantage as SE evolved. Its good you are staying loyal to your broker, as imo, a buyer broker services go well beyond just the timeliness of recognizing new inventory and completeness of such inventory. unfortunately it seems your broker is a victim of flaws in the sharing system at the vendor point which can only be solved by him reaching out to tech support at olr about the issue.

david87, urbandigs: Philip House is indeed listed by a REBNY firm, and the listings for Philip House hit Corcoran's listing system via the Rolex feed on 9/24. I also subscribe to OLR and it seems that OLR, too, received the listings on 9/24.

david87: When did you first see Philip House on SE? If it was more than 24 hrs before 9/24 the listing broker may be violating co-broke rules requiring they share the listing with the brokerage community within 24 hrs.

All: Not all brokers are equal. At Corcoran we have a listings department that will manually add listings to our listings database that did not come to us via the Rolex feed. Not all firms do this, and their agents probably have a higher likelihood of missing listings. The better, somewhat more tech-savvy brokers will setup notifications for themselves to see new listings as soon as they hit their listing system.

which fantastic listing at the philip house do you lose out on?

Columbiacounty, are you considering moving to the Philip House?

lpresser -- yes, I see the shared listings as of 9/24 as well, using RP

not sure why the OPs broker missed it then in their olr system

urbandigs: I find your comments and blog consistently helpful. You write, "a buyer broker services go well beyond just the timeliness of recognizing new inventory and completeness of such inventory." Have you ever written anything that spells out exactly the advantages and disadvantages (if any) of going with a seller's broker in your opinion? If so might you point us to it? If not, would you care to do so here?

Oops, correction urbandigs: I meant to write "...going with a BUYER'S broker..."

http://streeteasy.com/nyc/talk/discussion/30338-goldman-sachs-bombshell