Do You Need a Real Estate Agent to Find Yourself a Home?

We are living in exciting times when anything from the daily vegetables to the latest cutting edge gadget is available online; you can order it without stepping out of your house or touching it. You want information on the latest treatment of any disease or want a home in a locality of your choice with a playschool nearby you have online sites and apps to help you.


Well though all information is available online yet we do need the doctor; so do we still need real estate agents or are they redundant now? Do We Need Real Estate Agents? If I may say from my experience we do need them sometimes if not always! Last 10 years I have moved houses almost 6 times sometimes within the same city and sometimes to different cities as well. There have been times when we have been able to find the perfect house online and there have been times when it has not worked. We have visited houses based on online descriptions and have been disappointed to say the least.



 There was one instance when the description said spacious play area for children and a big pool too; what we found was one slide and one swing (broken) fixed in the corner of the parking and an empty pool which was used as storage for construction material. Then there have been times when the real estate agent has just led has to the perfect match after of course visiting two three locations and there have been times when we have waited endlessly for the person to show up or we have reached the place only to find the keys for the house that we wished to see being not available.  Whether one can look for a house online or is a real estate agent required will depend on the few factors which we discuss below.


 The relevance of a real estate depends largely on the city in which one is looking for a house. In metros looking for a house online may not be challenging but will be rather easier as the size of the city makes it difficult for one to scour the options physically. Moreover due to a large number of migrations in and out people are more likely to use the online route and the number of options is also huge. In smaller cities where the incidence of movement is lower, a real agent estate will be a better choice. Lesser choice of available options also makes it better to contact a person who knows the city well. Another factor that goes into deciding whether to look online or go old school is what are your requirements? If the requirement is just a home close to office the things will not be too difficult; however if one wants a house that has specific requirements like close to hospital, school, metro station or one is looking for a gated community etc then one must clearly scour options online.





 As when you go to an agent he caters to a particular area and might have limited options in a particular location. Buying v/s Renting When renting a house the stakes are less, the option is less permanent and the required paperwork is also minimal. The only thing required is the rent agreement and the police verification which are not complicated things and can be done pretty easily. When buying a house one needs to get a lot of paper work done; registering the house, stamp duties have to be paid and if one is taking a loan then things get more complex. You need to be sure about the property papers being authentic, whether all required approvals are taken, is the electricity connection there and so on. Again an under construction property require more attention to detail so in this case a real estate agent can come in handy. Even if you do not require him for finding the right property you may want to consult one before finalizing it. They have a lot of information and expertise which can come in handy. They can help you with the paper work and getting information about various approvals.



 There is no “online v/s real estate” situation, it is on a case to case basis. If one has the requisite time at hand and is confident about the city they can choose the online approach however if you do not want to get into the hassle yourself then the knowledge of the agents could come in handy. Both can work in tandem also in a situation; one is not mutually exclusive to the other.

So good luck find the right house for yourself with or without an agent.