It's late at night, you have a full workload tomorrow and you get a text from your real estate broker letting you know the listing paperwork for the sale of your home has just been sent for electronic signatures. You open the digital signature program, Authentisign, and the 20 pages of fine print is too much to go through in detail so you click click click to get it over with. Click click click, initial, initial, signature, signature - "complete signing" shows up on the screen and you're done. You go to bed wondering, what did I just sign!?
A complete file of listing paperwork for a single-family home is comprised of the following forms: 1A (Listing Agreement), Form 1 (Listing Input Sheet), Form 17 (Seller Disclosure), Legal Description from the title company, The Washington State Law of Agency Pamphlet and Form 22E (FIRPTA tax disclosure). Today I'll be pointing out some important things to know about your 1A - Listing Agreement. Remember, a listing agreement is a binding contract between you and a real estate firm so if push comes to shove (and it does sometimes) there are critical things you'll want to know.
- Once you list your home for sale on the MLS you can't decide to rent it out or sell it yourself on the sly to avoid paying commissions.
- You're hiring the brokerage which appoints a real estate broker (listing agent) to sell the home. This means that if the broker switches firms or quits real estate your listing stays with the original Brokerage, i.e., Windermere, Redfin, Mehr and Associates, etc.
- No one, including the seller or the listing agent is allowed to pre-market the property. This means social media, pre-listing showings, video etc. This term of the contract is often violated and subject to fines from the MLS.
-If you sell the property within 180 days after the listing expires (or is canceled) to a party procured by the listing agent through marketing efforts you owe the agreed-upon compensation/commission.
-The listing agreement advises sellers to call their property insurer to add a vacancy clause/rider to the homeowner policy.
- A seller is in violation of Washington State law by intercepting or recording peoples' conversations without their consent.
- If the earnest money is retained due to buyer default the listing brokerage retains 1/2 of the earnest money!
WOW! There's a lot of really important stuff in that 1A! If you would like to be emailed a 1A to read please email me at kristamehr@gmail.com. I bet you'll be surprised at what's in the fine print.
