What does a Buyer's Agent do?

While using a buyer's agent is more well-known on the east coast of Australia and overseas, many people in the west still aren't sure what the benefits are or what the cost is. Let us break it down for you.

​

When selling your house, you engage a licensed real estate agent to act on your behalf. This agent is known as the seller's agent. In the same way when buying a property, you can engage a fully licensed real estate agent to act on your behalf as the buyer's agent. And just like a seller's agent is invested in their seller's best interests, a buyer's agent is invested in their buyer's best interests. This means that we're working for YOU, the buyer. And we don't split the commission paid to the selling agent, we are paid independently by you, the buyer, so there is no conflict of interest.

​

You might engage a buyer's agent if you don't have the time to look for a property yourself or would like an objective third party to act in your best interests. You might be moving to Perth from interstate or overseas and don't have knowledge of local areas. A buyer's agent can take the stress and worry out of the buying process for you, and we also have access to off-market listings through our relationships with local selling agents, in addition to us pounding the pavement to find the property you're looking for.

​

Using our Premium Service as an example, to engage Drift Buyers Agency as your buyer's agent, you would pay a commencement fee of $1,500 (+GST) which starts our property finding services for you. When we successfully find a property that ticks all your boxes, we negotiate with the seller's agent (or directly with the seller if we have sourced the property off-market ourselves) to get the best price and conditions using current market data from a number of property data sources we use.

​

Once the buyer and seller have both signed off on the Offer and Acceptance, we will assist you in sourcing qualified building and pest inspections (fees billed separately) and a settlement agent/conveyancer, if required (fees billed separately). Pending finance approvals and satisfactory inspections and once the sale moves on to Unconditional Approval, the remaining 'Buying Fee', which we agree upon prior to commencement (either a fixed fee or up to 2% of the property purchase price), is owed to Drift Buyers Agency, or can be paid through settlement on prior written agreement. 

​

When you're competing with so many buyers at home opens and housing stock levels are incredibly low, using a buyer's agent is a sound decision and what you pay in fees we can save you in purchase price, time and stress!