Despite a market slowdown and repeated attempts by Internet-only companies to wrest business away, the brick-and-mortar real estate industry still has a firm hold on home sellers and buyers in the United States, according to the results of a survey released on Monday.[Survey Details].
In its September 2006 survey of consumers, the Discover Small Business Watch found that traditional real estate agents did well with home buyers, and exceedingly well with home sellers.
The survey shows that people selling their homes see much more value in having personal help when seeking buyers. Sixty-one percent of home sellers said they would prefer the services of an agent versus only 4 percent who said they would prefer an online service to help sell their homes.
Online services fared much better with buyers. Only half (49 percent) of buyers said they would prefer a real estate agent for their home search, while 22 percent would rather use an online service.
