Brokers as consultants? Who would have thunk it? (Me)

While perusing Twitter this morning I came across a piece posted by BrickUnderground from a recent conference on real estate in NYC. I don't usually pay a lot of attention to this stuff as most of the chatter is inter-broker related, nothing paradigm shifting which is what would get my attention. I eyed over the content and nothing stood out until I got to "Think of your broker as a consultant". Any one who has ever called me to inquire about our services knows part of my spiel is to describe our biz as a consulting model meets real estate brokerage operation; in other words we don't consider ourselves to be sales people.Nothing against sales folks, just not what we do over in this space.

As the paragraph in the blog points out everyone looking for an apartment these days is most likely looking at sites like StreetEasy , quite frankly the only site you need to look at. They give you all the data you need in one place and of course you can search for your new home there as well. Our focus has always been to help you understand all the quantifiable data that is relevant to your home purchase and add in my personal knowledge after 28 years as a broker in NYC. Not to mention the fact I raised two children in Chelsea, the West Village having arrived in the city in 1982. I have seen it all and then some! The dynamics of the city has changed so much since I first sent my son to West Village Nursery School in 1987 that you will never see the collapse in prices, services (baring a total collapse of all systems) that some predicted after the 2008 credit collapse. There are many reasons for this, however that is another conversation.

So it was very interesting for me to read this as this is what we do and it continues to evolve as we go along and continue to learn from our experiences. It is not just about rebates, that is simply one piece of our puzzle, it is the complete puzzle that makes us so successful.

Some don't understand our model, some may feel threatened by it (like many did when StreetEasy appeared) but in the end we feel the entire industry is better served through diversity, consumers having a choice in how they want to purchase property. Ask anyone who trades stocks through E trade, buys diamonds through Blue Nile or books a vacation via Kayak; now you can add "or purchased a home with the assistance of The Burkhardt Group." Successful agents, brokers understand this as it is our fiduciary duty to see to the highest needs of our clients, whether we are representing sellers or buyers; it is not just about us.