Selling homes is much more than showing someone a website address (or catalogue, if you like) and letting a buyer "pick one out". We spend a couple of hours interviewing the prospective sellers or buyers, discovering their "pain" or whatever their motivation is. Then we use our experience to communicate with them the process based on what they have told you and what you have seen. To start with the initial listing, there is all the paperwork, advertising, marketing, and the various other methods we use to do our job properly. Once we have a viewing there is the time speaking with a bank to make sure the prospective buyer are pre-approved (yes, that's always the first step unless the buyer has a suitcase full of Euros), narrowing down the location, property types, distributions, styles, etc. As Real Estate agents, we you are paid for our time and effort on somewhat of a gamble. We may spend just two or three hours with the customers and they make an offer tha...