Realtors in SL?

I have noticed that some land scavengers have decided to advertise themselves as realtors. I know that in RL realtors provide a valuable service to homeowners by helping them list and sell their homes for the best price and likewise helping home buyers find a particular home for the best price while making a commission from the sales.

But what exactly is the service these so called realtors in SL are providing? I can only see that they buy land cheaply, stick a sign and sometimes a tree on it then jack up the price. Is raising prices a service? How are they helping the consumer? Should they be calling themselves Realtors at all?

Depends on the person really... I don't advertise myself as a realtor, however I provide the services mentioned above.

If someone buys a plot of land from me, I'll let them exchange it in the future for an equivalent one. I'll help them out if they're having trouble terraforming their land, subdividing it, etc.

And, you're right. Those who aren't providing a valuable services should call themselves barons at best...

See that makes sense to a degree to me. I or anyone should be able to go to someone and tell them what type of land they want and for what price then the land dealer "goes to work" looking for what the customer is looking for. That is a service and perhaps one that is needed and should be widely advertised.

I've actually thought about offering that... Just wasn't sure what kind of demand there was for it. It makes alot of sense to charge say 1000 or 2000L and just spend some time looking for whatever the person wants. In the end, it may end up being better for everyone. I only have so much money so if I buy plots without having buyers, there's only so many I can buy. But if I only buy plots once I have buyers, then I can potentially buy a heck of alot more

Valuable to who?

To the consumer. The people who have no choice but to pay the elevated rates and really get nothing in return for their troubles.

We actually provide the service to the person selling the land, not the person buying it.

I agree the word realty is a bit shady of a term to use. I've seen many who use terms such as Reece's Land Sales or Reece's Land Business, obviously swapping Reece for their name. I think those are more accurate terms to use. I prefer to just use my name. I find it more convenient, besides if they remember Reece's Land Sales, but don't remember my last name is Gunawan, how do they go about contacting me when they want another lot?

That service being "you're selling this too cheap! Let me make sure noone can get land at a bargain and price that right up."?

Land barons are the ones who point out there is certainly no lack in demand for land, so whatever land you flip, would have sold as is, so you're really not even providing a service to the seller, only to yourself.

Thank you for the reasonable and honest response Reece. It is refreshing to see that at least one or a few land dealers do actually have some integrity and are willing to at least entertain the idea of actually offering value and service to their customers (the land buyer) without smugness or tricks.

Exactly. In the real-world, in general realtors only represent the seller and are legally obligated to disclose that to buyers. Only recently have "buyer's agents" become more widespread, but they are still the exception rather than the rule..

In second-life, whether that seller is the "realtor" themself, or some other individual, the real-life comparison would be appropriate: sell for the highest price the market will bear.

You're most welcome Tristan I'll be setting up a site to help SL residents buy land over the next few months. I'm definitely going to put up a voting section on the site asking visitors if they'd be interested in such a service. If I get alot of interest, I'll definitely consider doing it

I'm still not seeing the service part from your p.o.v. and really do not see the comparison either. They represent no one but themselves. Truth in advertising. None of them are or even resemble realtors. Land brokers or dealers yes, but realtors? Absolutely not.

I look forward to adding my vote if you do. The landbuyer in SL needs help getting the best deal possible more than ever now and help finding that perfect space to call home. Good luck.

Perhaps -- I suppose it depends on what service you believe real-life realtors provide.

I liked my real-life realtor, but I was never under any illusion that her goal was anything other than to generate a sale for her client, and that her best interests for the highest possible commission was to have me pay the highest possible price. The service that she provided was helping me to find and look at various homes that might be attractive.

So, I think that must be what you mean -- that "land brokers" in SL don't seem to provide the service of finding "good" spots.

But, in real-life, I've also come across realtors who have done nothing but send a listing of dozens of homes, and told me "go check out their Open Houses" and let me know if you're interested. Perhaps those real-life realtors, are more like the SL brokers.

Perhaps in SL, there will develop a form of landbroker who will actually provide services. For example, a buyer might say "I'm looking for a 2048 sqm parcel, that is bounded on at least one side by protected land", and the broker / realtor would help them find that.

Oh, and in RL as well, there are people who agree with your comment about realtors "not providing any services" of use to them. That's why people in the real world, familiar with the legal paperwork of properties, often have homes that are "For sale by owner" -- they don't see any benefit in having a realtor, who can not provide any services that they couldn't just as well do themselves.

"Broker" / "Baron" / "Realtor" / "Dealers" -- no matter what term we use, their goal, is to generate profit for themselves, which is fine. If they can generate better profit by ALSO providing services, then good for them -- they'll probably get my business someday! But in any case, I personally don't mind what they call themselves.

Don't forget, in SL, the "realtors" own the land they are selling, unlike in RL where they work on commission or for a fixed fee.

I think most land traders in SL are what are known as market makers, nothing more nothing less. As LL do not sell smaller than one sim plots to end users (with the exception of a limited supply at auction) all I could require (if interested) is a regular supply of land to buy (offer) and accept that the land trader will buy back at the (bid) with a fair "vig" or spread representing their own risk and costs.

Currently I would think I could buy almost any standard land I want at around $L14/$L15 and could sell almost instantly at $L10. I regard 4 to 5 basis points as an acceptable spread to enable a liquid market taking into account the land traders tier payments to Linden Labs

While accepting more desirable virtual land may sell for more (water access, protected access, mini islands etc) what does annoy me a little is avatars who set for sale land at stupid prices way out of the money. In essence they are hoping someone silly enough will come along and buy. Conversely I feel sorry for people who make a mistake in pricing land (the classic case is forgetting to add the necessary zeros as in $L4,000 for 2048 water access, rather than the more fair $L40,000). This I saw happen a few weeks ago

100% agreed. Don't let a parade of land flippers all claiming to work 17 hours a day performing hundreds of acts of kindness and generosity to their ecstatic customers fool you. Beyond vague concepts like liquidity and market efficiency land traders don't provide a service to anyone. Seller or buyer. We're simply taking advantage of our expertise, low risk adversity and a few other factors to make money for ourselves.

Oh yes, don't get me wrong. It's not like I do it out of the sheer joy of doing it, there is a definite profit motivation there. And like you say, any service I do provide is just a side effect of what I do for myself.



The bid / spread is a useful concept here, the SL land market behaves much more like a foreign currency or stock exchange than a RL land market. For some reason, peoples emotional attachment to the concept of "land" seems to make them want to apply different requirements to those dealing in them than they would for currency or stock traders.

Your candor and honesty is greatly appreciated. A prior poster suggested that they "provide a service to the seller, not the buyer". What was missing from that statement was that they, themselves were the seller, therefore the entire business is self-serving.

Thanks Elanthius.

When I said that, I was referring to the person who was comparing it to the process of a private seller selling to a private buyer, and my reference to the seller was meant to be the original seller, not me.

Hope that clears that up.

Re·al·tor (rē'əl-tər, -tôr')

A service mark used for a real-estate agent affiliated with the National Association of Realtors. This service mark often occurs in print in lowercase and in the plural as well.

Unless you fit this definition, people really need to stop using that term in SL.

If I understand correctly, usually (not always) a "market maker" / "dealer" / whatever you'd like to call them, buys an entire Sim at auction, divides it up into parcels, and then sells them, either to middlemen resellers, or to end users.

I was wondering whether any of the whole-Sim buyers had ever provided a "reservation" or "first priority" service like the following, or whether such a service would even have a market:

1. BEFORE a Sim even went to auction, individuals would place "requests" to the Sim-buyer, for example "I'd like a 4096 sq m plot with water on one side"
   
2. the Sim-buyer would quote a price, which would likely be HIGHER than the going market rate for that sort of parcel
   
3. AFTER the Sim buyer won the auction for the Sim, he'd carve out such a parcel, set the price as previously agreed on, and sellable only to that individual, and notify the individual of the location
   
4. the individual would have 12h or 24h to make the purchase, after which the land would be opened up for general sale
   

No L$ changes hands prior to the actual sale, so that even if the dealer doesn't win the auction, or an appropriate parcel is not carved out, or the end-user doesn't close the deal, nobody loses any L$, other than the delay of 12h or 24h.

I wonder whether some end-users would be willing to pay prices HIGHER than going market rates, just to avoid the hassle of trying to be on at the right time, to find the type of parcel they wanted before other people snatched it up?

Or would the hassle for the Sim-buyer of keeping track of these requests combined with the general "seller's market" at this point make such a service not sufficiently more profitable for the dealer?

I think many people use it to get away from the negative connotations associated with the word "baron". I haven't found that referring to myself in such a way has hurt my business -- if anything, it's more upfront and honest about what your actual intentions are.

I've tried to do a similar thing a couple of times. Although with much more relaxed rules than the rather harsh ones you've listed here and for not particularly higher prices. Admittedly I'm not the greatest networker/organiser in the world but my response both times was essentially zero.

I'm still open to this. If I could just find a few people who were interested some very awesome things could be achieved. Such as mainland sims that are literally owned by the individual residents but that are themed in nice ways, say Gorean or Furry or Railroads or Victorian or anything really. Even better if there was a lot of interest we have the opportunity to buy several sims together and have a nice view all around. Also, you wouldn't even have to buy the land you could rent it from me. Anyway, sorry for the rant/advert.