Hellobee Boards

I know you said nothing is for sale on that street, but attending open houses in the neighborhood is a good way to meet realtors. We met our realtor and our mortgage broker by attending an open house in our favorite neighborhood (mortgage broker happened to live next door to the listing).

@Modern Daisy: I know you said you didn't want to let anyone know where you wanted to live, but can you PM me the town? My brother's good friend is a realtor on the main line, and he was our realtor. He was honestly amazing. Very knowledgeable about the area, not at all pushy, and patiently stuck with us in seeing over 100 houses. His family has been in real estate in the area for 80+ years. I'd recommend him in a heartbeat. Let me know!

Are you sure that marketing pocket listings (before it hits market) is legal in your state? I guess that would be the first thing to research, because that could make a big difference. If so, then (if I were you) I would probably try to find out if one particular realtor or small office has sold homes recently on that street/surrounding street.

We’ve found our realtors sort of haphazardly. One was recommended and was a total dud because she did NOT listen and kept trying to show us homes that literally didn’t meet any of the criteria we gave her. Another realtor we used we found via an open house. He was fine, but I definitely did the heavy lifting of researching and then he set up showings. Like you, I was interested in one particular street in a town and asked him to cold call people and see if a few people were interested in selling and he was totally taken aback by that request and looked at me like I had 10 heads. The final realtor we’ve used we found randomly through Craigslist. Young and AMBITIOUS and very motivated. He is a great realtor and was willing to start contacting the owners of every house I was interested in, even if the house was not on the market. It sounds like you need an ambitious go-getter too; but also someone who is also willing to wait, which might be a hard find as obviously they are only making money once you actually buy.

If you don’t plan on buying for a few years, I personally wouldn’t engage anyone now or even worry about it really. I would just stalk the MLS listings for your state and be ready to move on anything that pops up. When something pops onto the market you’ll be able to find and retain a relator, they are not hard to find.

Each agent is an individual, so it doesn't really matter which brokerage they work under. The only way to know who lists the most houses on that street is to have access to the MLS and look at the closed sales. The only way to do that is through an agent.

@Modern Daisy: I hear you...have you seen any houses that have sold in the neighborhood recently? So even within the last year or two? You could try looking on zillow to see if there's a trend in who listed those houses and try to find one that way.

I think you are totally fine to start interviewing agents. I would put together a list of questions.

I dont think you'll find that one agent randomly has a ton of listings in one area versus another. So target your interview questions another way:

How many homes did you sell last year? How many buyers did you help last year? How many of these were in this immediate area we are considering.

How long have you been living/working in the area? How well connected are you to the community (aka how likely they would hear word of mouth about something coming on the market).

I think you have a lot of ideas on how to find different Realtors (from comments above). Another important thing to consider is how well you would work with the Realtor. If you are detail oriented, you need a detail oriented Realtor. If making decisions quickly and seeing properties immediately is important to you, then you need to look for someone who is very responsive.