If you’re wondering about the cost difference between using a realtor and real estate attorney, then it’s likely that you’re already considering selling your home on your own without a real estate agent.
I’ve got two pieces of good news for you:
- Our course covers everything you need to know to sell your home on your own and save thousands of dollars in the process, and
- As an attorney, I can easily answer this question.
Why a Real Estate Attorney is a Good Idea When Selling Your Home
Especially today where it’s very easy to list and sell your own home (especially with the right guidance), most home sellers look for professional help because of the complexity and legal significance of the real estate transaction.
Effectively, home sellers could use someone to hold their hand and give them some legal guidance through the process to make sure all the disclosures, contracts, legal forms, etc.
If that’s you, you should get a real estate lawyer and NOT a real estate agent.
Why?
Quite simply, real estate agents are not allowed to give legal advice! Despite this prohibition against realtors giving legal advice, far too often they try to give it anyway.
This should matter both to prospective buyers and sellers because if the advice ends up being wrong, perhaps because the realtor was a little over-confident and doesn’t really understand the nuances of the law, then when there’s a contract dispute or a legal issue, you’re going to be the one left dealing with the problem.
Sure, if you get bad advice and end up getting sued because your realtor pretended to be a legal expert, you could go after the realtor later in another legal dispute because they gave you bad advice, but that sounds like MUCH more hassle than just doing things properly in the first place and avoiding all of the legal hassle.
If you use a real estate attorney, you’re getting actual legal advice and, if they make a mistake, you’ll be covered because any properly licensed attorney carries insurance to cover mistakes like this.
Real Estate Agent Cost
Real estate agents are ABSURDLY expensive for the work that they do.
You should expect to pay around 6% of the final sale price of your home to agents in exchange for them completing a few hours of work.
If you’d like to see how much you’d lose to agents out of your hard-earned equity in your home, check out our commission calculator.
On a $1 million home sale, the seller would be losing $60,000.00.
Real Estate Attorney Cost
Real estate attorney fees are almost always significantly lower than real estate agent fees.
For example, even a really expensive attorney that charges $500 per hour, will only end up costing you $2,250 in legal fees after four and a half hours of work (a common amount of time per transaction).
This is an important point to note: a legal expert, and actual attorney who knows real estate law, is significantly less expensive than your neighbor who also happens to be a real estate agent. That alone should show how over-priced realtors are.
Some lawyers may even work off of a flat fee instead of an hourly rate – this can be even nicer (but sometimes more expensive) because you know exactly what to expect for your costs in the transaction.
Attorney VS Agent – Which is best?
This is hard to answer because they do two completely different things.
Agents list your home online for you, schedules the photographer to take pictures, and answers the phone when people call with questions about your home.
Real estate attorneys can help you with the purchase contract, negotiations, legal disclosures, closing documents, and any other legal document.
If you need help with the listing of your home and the marketing of it, either hire an agent for 6% of the value of your home or take our online course and do it yourself.
If you need help with the legal aspect, please hire an actual attorney.
