Service You Can Trust

Not only do many brokers characterize buyers as “liars” (generally in less of a malicious and more of a frustrated way), but they also think of sellers as greedy. I disagree. Buyers don't swear to tell the truth.(Flickr photo by Office of Gov. Patrick.) What happens with buyers is that they begin...

There’s a flurry of activity in the nation’s capital to clamp down on U.S. workers that are misclassified as independent contractors, a category under which all but a tiny minority of real estate agents falls. According to Realtor magazine, a publication of the National Association of Realtors (N...

When co-op buyers see the words “sponsor apartment” in a converted building in New York City, their eyes invariably light up with anticipation.  In fact, some buyers will specify that they want both to live in a co-op and to buy only a sponsor apartment. A decent sponsor apartment with minimal cl...

There is no shortage of bad brokers–those who are some combination of lazy, incompetent, unprofessional, unethical or nothing more than avaricious. Of course, there are lots of good brokers in New York City and elsewhere as well. The question at hand: Is there a clear connection between the quali...

I recently finished reading Alice Schroeder’s extraordinarily well written and researched biography of Warren Buffett.  It is called “The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life.” There is plenty of business in the book, but I was more interested in the man.  Although anyone who knows a...

Brokers flout Fair Housing laws with impunity By Malcolm Carter When it comes to many matters relating to real estate, the Big Apple often lags the rest of the country. One prime example discussed on this blog concerns the continuing resistance, especially by the biggest brokerages, to a Multiple...