Latest / Connor with Honor: AI, Real Estate and Real Life / Before You Hire an Agent or Lender… WATCH THIS Santa Clarita Seller's Agent exclusive podcast

Transcript

Before You Hire an Agent or Lender… WATCH THIS Santa Clarita Seller's Agent exclusive podcast · Connor with Honor: AI, Real Estate and Real Life

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Well, good day, everybody.
• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: February 27th, 2026, Connor McIver here, Santaclarita Openhouses.com.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: A new site that I have unveiled recently, got it put up a couple days ago, scv123.com.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Talks about sellers agent-only strategies.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: Might be worth a look.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: Let's get into the seven-day market watch here for residential properties.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'll be covering these numbers here.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: And the numbers, of course, tell a story of a market that's preparing for its typical spring surge.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: So if you think that real estate is just going to stay this way throughout 2026, probably wrong.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: What's going to end up happening is we're going to see more and more inventory start hitting the market as we close out February, which we got, what, one day, I think.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: And then now we're getting into March, and that's going to start kicking up real estate listings.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Currently, right now, 529 total active listings across the market for sale.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: We're watching as those interest rates are morphing in a way somewhere around six.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's going to depend very much on your credit profile, a lot of other factors, but that's kind of what that rate everybody's talking about.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: Now, when you're hearing lenders talk about interest rates and they're promising a certain rate or talking about it, first off, they shouldn't really be putting that in a very uh very precise perspective.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: It should be a little bit more global because it's going to depend on your credit profile.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: But some online platforms, I see this quite a bit, lend big lending outfits, they kind of do a little bait and switch.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: They kind of tease you.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: I see some agents doing this sort of thing as well.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: Some kind of grant or some kind of first buyer program, first-time buyer programs as well.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: Seller exclusive type selling platforms also.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: Just be careful.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Make sure whoever you hire when you're talking to people about real estate, you're reading all the small prints, so well, you don't get taken.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: Everything that you sign should be what you're held to.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: And if there's something that they're going to try to hold you to or cause issue with you, I would definitely raise a stink about that.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: And any weird question that you have or a weird feeling, or even if you just want to make sure the record's straight, because maybe they told you that they're going to promise you a rainbow, a rainbow laden unicorn with uh Pegasus type wings, and they're promising that at the closing of the sale.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: And it sounds, wow, that sounds too good to be true.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: You might want to follow that up in an email.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: Say, hey, listen, uh, Connor, you were promising me that winged Pegasus rainbow horse thing.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, just wanted to make sure I heard you correctly or make sure that that was in fact what I understood because that's uh that's why I'm having you sell my house because who doesn't want one of those?
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: All right, so we have six coming soon listings.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, that that is just this.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: We total coming soon listings, 13 of those happen to be on the market right now for sale.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: They haven't entered the market yet.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: There's anywhere between a time period of zero to 21 days, and a lot of sellers use these strategies also.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, bottom end of that, and again, I wish I could tell you all of these.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: If you have an agent, reach out to them and say, send me the coming soon age, the coming soon listing, they'll be able to send them to you.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: We have all the way 699 looks like the no 445 is the low, and the top that's going to top out at 1.8 million, looks like in the coming soon realm.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: Ask your agent to send that to you.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: I just represent sellers, I don't represent buyers.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I switched to that protocol several years ago.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: But if you're uh buyer, you have buyer, your buyer's agent, you have somebody working for you, have them send you those coming soon listings so you can see it.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: All right, so we have uh 60 properties, just had their prices changed in this last seven days.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: That's a massive amount.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we see that up from the 20s and 30s, which is typical.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, the market is getting right close to that march.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: I know sellers are starting to see that they might have more competition, but also prices might stay very steady, might increase a little bit depending on the amount of buyers out there that are willing to purchase real estate.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: If the amount of listing stays where it is, 529, then we're probably going to see more buyers entering the market.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it could actually put the needle further back into the seller zone about listing.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: Right now it's taking some odd 60 days to get properties in escrow.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: If it's taking a little bit longer than that, then what's going to end up happening?
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you'll have to come to a realization as a seller that you're probably overpriced.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, a lot of agents talk about chasing the market down.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: That usually doesn't matter.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: What happens is you lower your property to a particular point.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: Now you're within the buyer's view.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: And a lot of buyers aren't searching at their top end, they're going maybe a little bit above that.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: And though they will eventually see your house.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: And then some buyers are just kind of looking globally at it a little bit larger as far as what they can really qualify for.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: But I don't think buyers are scared to write lower than listing price offers either.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: So don't think that that's going to be limiting you.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: But it does come down to exposure.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: And it does come down to people that want to buy something if they see something overpriced.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they look at that as being unreasonable.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: So they don't even approach it because they don't think.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: But it's up to those buyers' agents to say, listen, I've run the numbers.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: This property is priced, let's say, at 1.1 million, but I ran the numbers and there's nothing that's sold that's comparatively so at any more than 990, for example.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: So now they're$110,000-ish overpriced.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: That would be something that a good buyer's agent is going to follow up with their buyer.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: They're going to put together an offer if that's a property they really want, and they're going to do a justification as to why they're offering that particular amount of money.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: And then that's going to get over to the seller's agent.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: The seller's agent's probably going to be somewhat thankful, especially if it's articulated in the factual, correct, data-driven way.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: They're able to present that to the seller, and then the seller then will be able to make a decision and see potentially that they are overpriced.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: Now, if the agent sold them on that price, there's probably another thing that's going to have to come to play.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: There's going to have to be some uh conversation, I would imagine.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: All right, so nationally we're seeing what the analysts call the great housing reset.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: Wild price swings of the early 2020s have smoothed out into a more normal trajectory.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: Mortgage rates have stabilized around the 6 to 6.3% range, which is what I talked about.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: But again, it depends totally on your credit profile, which is finally coaxing some hesitant sellers off the sidelines.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: Now we're not in a boom or a bust.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: We're in a period of price discipline where value-sensitive buyers are actually starting to negotiate again.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: And California and Los Angeles County in the Golden State median home price hovering around$905,000.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: Inventories up roughly about 10% statewide.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: The lock-in effect, homeowners staying put to keep those low rates.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because some people that own properties out there, uh, they're in two and three.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: And I was watching a cat, uh, Mike Meena, one of the local lenders out here, he was mentioning that at one time it was all uh each each of those mortgages, that interest rate, the mortgages were transferable.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: You could actually, you know, purchase those from the actual homeowner and assume that rate, of course, if you had the money to make up whatever the difference it was.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: But we see that that's very specific now.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: So banks really aren't big fans of having a seller that has a 2% interest rate.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, let the buyer assume that loan at a 2% interest rate.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: They're not big fans of that.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: But there are certain types of loans you can do that with.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe that's worth worth a little bit of an investigation.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: You just have to see if you have the wherewithal to do it.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: And if somebody is sitting at a 2 or 3% interest rate, it could be that there's quite a bit of equity tied up in that residence.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: So then on the other, on the seller side of it, they're gonna have to investigate what the buyer has.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: Do they have the wherewithal to be able to bring it up to where the seller's level happens to be, happens to be what they're happy with?
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then how is that gonna happen?
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: Is it gonna be some kind of a loan that the buyer's able to secure?
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: Do they have some other properties or something else they can lean it up against, or is it gonna be a cash injection to make it work?
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: Who knows?
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: So Santa Cruita Valley, we have uh neutral or balanced market median sales price out here, 760 to 777,000, 777,000.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: Good number.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: That's depending on the zip code, of course.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: The city, we have a healthy amount of new construction.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: Moving forward, we have Wiley Canyon, Bouquet Canyon products, projects, both of those.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: And that's going to be bringing a lot more traffic out here, which I know everybody's happy about.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: And the headline for SCV today's stability.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: Neither buyers or sellers have a massive upper hand.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's kind of an even market, depending on listing and how that listing enters the market.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: And it does, um, it's a good time for a fair deal, I think, for buyers out there.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: Do your investigations.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, there's a specialist advantage in the world why your agent side matters in today's market.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: You might hear the term sellers only agent or buyer's only agent.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: These are agents that have made explicit decisions to represent one side and not the other side.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that frees up a little bit of the concern out there with regard to dual agency.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: Dual agency, where an agent represents both a seller and the buyer on the same property, is completely legal in California.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: There's a few states that don't allow that process.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: I think Canada, also one of the countries that doesn't allow it.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: But in California, it's all good.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: Not a fan.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, never have been a fan.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's very difficult to play that bipolar agent because if you represent the seller and then you also represent the buyer, and then the buyer wants certain things, and you know, now you go back to your seller, the one that the seller hired you, right?
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: So now you sit down at that same table and you say, okay, well, at least some agents still sit down at the table.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: So I sit down at the table and I say, okay, well, this is what the uh this is this is what the the buyer's asking for here.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: And uh they want$10,000 uh closing cost credit, or they want$10,000 in a price reduction because of these things they found out with the house.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: And then they say, well, you know, we told you the things that were wrong with the house, and you said it was going to be okay.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: And then you're sitting there like, hmm.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, but you know, the buyer, well, and and you're representing the buyer, isn't there something, you know?
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: So it becomes a little weird.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: And some agents have no problem with it, some sellers don't mind it.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: I really think that it's nice just to be able to be on the seller's side 100%.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: The buyer has their own agent, and then the buyer and and uh the buyer's agent and me.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: We we try to work it out, but I get to stay 100% on the seller's side without being concerned about any kind of extra funds or commissions coming from the buyer.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_00: And when you don't handle any buyers at all, makes it even better because now you can be a seller's only agent.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: And there are some buyers' agents, I have a network of them that only represent buyers.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: So it works out well.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: No relation, no same company, just you know, agents that just handle real estate buyers.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: And again, having your your own, you know, your own road into that particular either sellers or buyers, I think it happens.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: So when an agent only represents sellers, there's zero dual agency conflict.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: They aren't literally trying to sell their own listing to double a commission, potentially, or uh they're focused solely, definitely on protecting your equity, managing the complex disclosures.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: Now, you'll you can see that buyers-only agents on the other side, they work exclusively for the buyer, the person looking for a home.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, they're your scout and your shield.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: They look for the red flags and the coming soon listings and handle the poker game of negotiations in a market where homes are staying active for over 70 days.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: You do need someone who knows how to ask for repairs, credits, price reductions without blinking.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: And the commissions on both sides, up to you.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: You have to negotiate that with the people that you're willing or going to hire, and then find out exactly what their mindset is and what they're gonna be doing to earn that commission.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: It shouldn't be vague and ambiguous, it should be something that they're able to explain and give past historical events that back up their value and what they're worth.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: All right, so moving through many of the different markets out there, we see that we're gonna start picking up in listings here in the next couple weeks.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna see more starting to hit the market.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to get those coming soon listings, make sure you hit up your agent.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: They'll be able to send those to you.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: And if you don't have an agent while they don't represent buyers, at least you'll be able to get them.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: I can email them to you whenever they hit the market for sale.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: But if you have a buyer's agent, I would say just tie yourself with them and have them send you the coming soon listings.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: If you don't have one and you don't know where to start and all that other happy stuff, call me.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'll find you one and we'll get you all set up.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Connor with Honor.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for watching today.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: We'll see you tomorrow.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: Have a happy Friday.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: Be well.