How Buyers Choose a Real Estate Agent: What Agents Should Do

How do buyers find a real estate agent today?

The same NAR research reports that 43 percent of buyers found their agent through a referral from a friend, neighbor or relative. It also reports that 52 percent of buyers found the home itself on the internet.

A referral gives a buyer a name. What the buyer finds when they look up that name is the next thing they see. That is why an agent’s Google Business Profile, reviews and website matter even when most business comes from referrals.

Why does it matter that most buyers interview only one agent?

Because the decision is usually made before a second agent ever gets a call. An agent who is easy to find, easy to check and clear about what they do often wins without competing.

An agent who is hard to find, or whose details do not match from one site to the next, can lose a referred client without ever knowing the client looked.

What do careful buyers and sellers check before they call?

Careful clients check the license. Every state runs a public license lookup. In Louisiana, the Louisiana Real Estate Commission publishes a public license search on its own portal that shows the license type, the license status and the sponsoring broker.

Then they check reviews and the agent’s own pages. The simplest thing an agent can do is make sure the name, brokerage and contact details on the Google profile and website match the license record exactly. Louisiana licensees should also follow the commission’s advertising rules on showing the sponsoring broker.

How do clients find a good real estate agent, step by step?

For a client, how to find a good real estate agent is a short list of checks, in this order. An agent who passes each one is easy to choose; an agent who fails one usually never hears why.

• Ask friends and neighbors who recently bought or sold a home nearby which agent they used, and why.
• Look up each name on the state license search to confirm an active license and the sponsoring brokerage.
• Read online reviews on Google and the agent’s own profile, including how the agent replies to criticism.
• Check recent sales: how many homes the agent helped clients buy or sell in the past year, in which neighborhoods and price range.
• Interview at least one agent in person or by video, and ask for the key answers in writing.
• Read the representation agreement before signing it.

Choosing an agent this way takes an afternoon. For the agent, each step is something a client can see before the first call, which is why it pays to keep every one of them current.

What questions should an agent be ready to answer in the interview?

The questions worth preparing for are the ones with checkable answers. How many transactions did you personally close in the past twelve months, and in which price range? Who else will handle my file? What does the agreement say about canceling?

Questions about years in the business and knowledge of the area count for less, because every agent answers them the same way. An agent who can hand over a one-page track record, with closed transactions and average days on market for the past year, has said something a client can verify.

Should buyers and sellers interview more than one agent, and what do they compare?

Consumer advice almost always says to interview more than one agent, and NAR’s own figures show most buyers don’t. An agent should plan for both. Most clients will talk to one agent, so the first conversation has to answer everything. The careful ones will interview multiple agents, so the answers have to be checkable.

What a careful buyer or seller compares is concrete. How well does the agent know the local market: recent sales prices against list prices, days on market, and which neighborhoods move fastest, from the multiple listing service rather than from memory? How does the agent communicate: phone calls, texts, or a weekly email, and how quickly?

For sellers, what is the plan for pricing, photos, open houses and social media? For buyers, how will the agent find the right home before it is gone, and what happens when there are multiple offers?

What should sellers look for in a listing agent?

Sellers should ask how the agent will set the listing price, how the home will be marketed to potential buyers, and how often they will hear from the agent. A good answer on price uses recent comparable sales from the multiple listing service, not a number picked to win the listing.

Selling your home also means agreeing on a communication style before signing: who calls, how often, and how fast. Ask how many homes the agent has sold in the past year in the same price range, and how close those sales came to the original listing price.

For an agent who lists homes, those answers belong on a one-page plan the seller can keep. Selling homes is a crowded field, and a written plan is one of the few things a seller can compare side by side.

What is the difference between a buyer’s agent and a listing agent?

A listing agent represents the seller: pricing the home, marketing it and negotiating with potential buyers. A buyer’s agent represents the buyer: finding homes, writing offers and negotiating for the buyer. For a client buying a home, the written buyer agreement described below sets out that relationship.

Some states allow one agent or brokerage to represent both sides of a sale with written consent, and the rules vary by state. Clients buying and selling at the same time should ask how the agent handles both, and the agent should explain it before either agreement is signed. Whether a client wants to buy or sell, the goal is the same: choose the right real estate agent for that side of the deal.

What do the REALTOR Code of Ethics and the 2024 buyer agreement rules mean for a client?

Two things change what a client should expect before buying or selling a home. First, only members of the National Association of REALTORS may call themselves REALTORS, and members agree to its Code of Ethics, adopted in 1913. Every licensee, member or not, is bound by state license law, and the state commission is where complaints go. For anyone working out how to pick a realtor, the REALTOR title means NAR membership; the state license lookup confirms the person can legally practice.

Second, NAR’s practice changes took effect on 17 August 2024: real estate professionals now require a written agreement with a buyer before touring a home. A buyer should expect to sign one early. The agent should explain what it covers, how long it runs, how it ends, and what it says about compensation, which is a term to agree, not a fixed number.

Can marketing replace a strong track record?

Marketing cannot replace a strong track record. An agent at the top of a Google map result has a well-maintained Google Business Profile. That profile says nothing about negotiation, disclosure handling or contract management.

Top Real Estate Systems builds that visibility for agents and states the limit plainly: being found is the start of the conversation, not proof of the outcome. The best marketing gets a qualified client to the interview. The track record and the agreement win it.

What should an agent walk a client through before they sign?

The representation agreement: how long it runs, how to cancel it, and what it says about compensation. Those terms bind the client for the duration and are negotiable before signature, not after.

Clients who understand those terms up front have fewer surprises later. State commissions are also where complaints go. In Louisiana, the Louisiana Real Estate Commission handles consumer complaints against licensees and publishes its license law.

Why doesn’t Top Real Estate Systems publish best-agent lists?

Top Real Estate Systems publishes no ranked list of agents in any city and recommends no individual agent to consumers. Top Real Estate Systems is paid by agents to manage their visibility, which would make any ranked list it published an advertisement rather than a finding.

Agents who want to be chosen are better served by being easy to verify than by appearing on a paid list. A ranking published by a vendor whose clients appear in it should be read that way anywhere it appears.

Where do the facts on this page come from?

Every figure on this page is attributed to a named, linked source published by Google, by the National Association of REALTORS, or by Top Real Estate Systems itself. Anything Top Real Estate Systems has not independently verified is labelled as unverified at the point where it appears.

• National Association of REALTORS — Get the Facts: practice changes, 17 August 2024
• National Association of REALTORS — The Code of Ethics
• Louisiana Real Estate Commission — public license search portal
• Louisiana Real Estate Commission — consumer links
• National Association of REALTORS — 2025 Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers, highlights