What are the drawbacks of an exclusive contract on my rental property with a real estate agent?
March 9th, 2010 | 
Author: I hаνе a vacation rental property іn Costa Rica аnd I hаνе received аn offer frοm a real estate agent fοr exclusive rights tο thе property fοr Friday, Saturday, аnd Sunday. Lеt mе hear аnу perceived drawbacks anyone саn rесkοn οf.
Posted in Rental Properties
If you rent it yourself you still need to pay the agent their commission.
Any time you give a weirder any “rights”, you are trusting that they will be honorable and that they won’t cheat you. And that they will work hard promoting your interests. That is simple if you have worked with that person for years. Not so simple if you have never met them.
So write a cancellation clause into any agreement. At any time you can unilaterally cancel the contract by paying her everything you owe her plus $250. If she won’t agree to that, she wasn’t looking out for you anyway.
Fortunately you do not need to write in a cancel clause. You can withdraw this contract at anytime. But, this sounds very silly. An agent wants a 3 day contract? Just tell them to get busy and earn a commision. Realtors are usually uneducated and very legally ignorant people. They write contracts all the time that are illegal and would be thrown out of incite in a heartbeat. I know, I challenged many and when a contract violates law – its void – its no excellent and 99% of these realtor contracts violate general law. Most people do not know this – you cannot write anything into a contract that contradicts general law. For instance someone force agree in writing to be your pimp – but in view of the fact that the law forbids it that contract is not going to be enforceable. Its the same thing no matter the subject or industry. The realtor is just wasting time trying to look qualified when in the end the opposite comes out – wasting time and really ignorant of legal framework.
The small of it is they know you are going to rent it. With an exclusive contract they will get a commission from you if YOU rent it. Which is what they are in suspense for. They are toying with you so they can guilt you into a commission when you rent it yourself. Buyers agents do this all the time. Thats why they want contracts. They know they are terrible agents and the only way they can get $ from people is to have contacts then chase them if they have any activity. Excellent agents have no time for this.