Why Can’t Unrepresented Buyers Receive the Buying Agent’s Commission
While in theory you could submit a slightly lower purchase offer to account for the absence of a buying agent’s commission, the listing agent will likely steer their sellers away from such an offer.
California real estate law only allows commissions to be paid out to licensed real estate brokerages. Even if you were to do all of the work of a traditional agent yourself, and did not have a buying agent representing you, the selling agent would not be able to able to pay you the buying agent’s commission. Under this scenario, the selling agent would likely pocket the buying agent commission, or try to steer you to a colleague or friend to “represent” you (and pocket the commission).Either way, you would do all of the work, and a real estate agent would get paid the buying agent’s commission.
While in theory you could submit a slightly lower purchase offer to account for the absence of a buying agent’s commission, the listing agent will likely steer their sellers away from such an offer. So unfortunately, you’re unlikely to ‘earn’ any of the commission by buying your home without an agent (you may still want to go down this route for a more seamless process).
Fortunately, Unlocked is here to help such buyers who’d like a better deal than a traditional agent. We give buyers 1% of the purchase price cashback! That’s a large portion of the commission back to the buyer (where we think it belongs). Whatsmore, with Unlocked, you’ll get a full-service buying agent who’ll be able to help you with all aspects of the purchase. We’ve leveraged technology to deliver insight and streamline the process, to help buyers where we think we can add a lot of value (e.g., valuing a property, reviewing the disclosures and submitting a competitive offer).
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We cover the entire Bay Area. We've helped clients buy homes in San Francisco, North Bay, East Bay and South Bay. We also cover LA and San Diego in Southern California.
We provide all of the services of a traditional real estate agent, with better data-driven tools, increased transparency and more responsive customer service. We can help with as little or as much of the home-buying process as you require. Some clients come to us with a home already found and a price in mind, and need assistance with assessing the home and executing the transaction. Others are still figuring out their budget, what they're looking for, and advice on where to focus their search. Wherever you are in your home buying journey, we’re here to seamlessly guide you through your home buying process - finding the right home, valuing it, understanding the disclosures, submitting a competitive offer, and closing the transaction. We're with you from start to finish.
Yes. Unlocked is a fully-licensed California brokerage (CalDRE #02060530) and all of our agents are fully-licensed California sales agents and members of the California Association of Realtors (TM) and the National Association of Realtors (TM).
With Unlocked, you’ll be working with one of our fully-licensed real estate agents to get all of the services provided by a traditional real estate agent, with better data-driven tools, increased transparency and more responsive customer service. So in many respects, your buying experience will be the same as working with a traditional real estate agent - only better!
In terms of how we’re different, firstly, we offer 1% cash back. This is the largest buyer’s rebate in California (that we know about)! That is tens of thousands of dollars that you can put that towards buying new furniture, renovating your kitchen and bathrooms or throwing that all important housewarming party (or more responsible uses like paying down your mortgage).
Secondly, our backgrounds are different than traditional real estate agents. We are a Stanford MBA and a Yale Law JD, who have also worked at some of the top management consulting, law and private equity firms (Bain & Company, Boston Consulting Group, Wachtell and Bain Capital). We leverage our data-driven, customer-oriented experiences to deliver a more insightful, analytical and responsive home buying experience.
Thirdly, Unlocked has built custom analytical tools to bring data, insight and transparency to the key buying decision points and streamlined the buying process. For every home you’re interested in, we provide our Custom Valuation Report, an easy-to-interpret spreadsheet of recent comparable transactions, competing listings and third-party valuations, as well as our Disclosure Review Summary, a comprehensive summary of the 200+ pages of disclosures.
All-in-all, we’ve designed the buying experience that we would have wanted when we bought our homes, and we’re sure you’ll love it, just like our current and past clients have (check out our Yelp reviews).
One of our licensed real estate agents personally leads each transaction and will be your day-to-day point of contact throughout your home buying journey. We work closely as a team, and are able to jump in for each other if and when you have a time-sensitive request.