Anyone who has worked in REO has asked this question at least once in their real estate career. When considering your answer, it is important to look at all of your personal experience, strengths, skills, and passions. REO, just like any type of real estate, must be supported by a specific set of skills and a particular business model. In order to remain a reputable business and keep strong relationships with asset management companies, it is vital to have a dependable, well-equipped back office.
Going forward, REO will not follow the same model we have become accustomed to. Agents who choose to stay the course and operate solely in REO will become specialists in their individual markets. This is largely due to the fact that many asset management companies have been affected by the same growth and pullback that our agent and broker community has experienced.
In the future, asset managers will look for well-qualified cradle-to-grave REO agents who enable streamlined transactions and require less manpower on the asset management side. In my experience, the agents who show the most commitment, knowledge, and adaptability to asset managers are the agents who receive listings and will continue to receive listings even as inventories fall.
Our economy is credit driven—that fact alone ensures REO will always exist in some shape. Therefore, servicers and lenders will always need agents and brokers.
My father had an interesting saying he told me once when I was young: “A gastroenterologist and a pulmonologist are both doctors and both went to medical school. But they work on two completely different parts of the body. Would you go see the pulmonologist about a stomachache?”
Agents and asset managers both have the same client—the banks and investors—so they will always need each other in every market and region across the country. When searching for a local partner, they will look for dedication, education, and the unwavering ability to meet a client’s needs.
About the FORCE member: Patrick D’Agostino
Patrick D’Agostino established his of knowledgeable agents and support team in 2006. His staff are all well-versed and effective when it comes to REO. They continue to educate themselves in the changing market. His members attend all major conferences in order to stay ahead of the curve and provide the best possible service to their business partners. He has two offices serving Orlando and Central Florida. They sell the assets their competition previously failed to sell. In 2013 I left RE/Max to pursue an opportunity that Ami Curtis, Mary Martin & Marc Carpenter at Allison James Estates & Homes Elite.