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Read Some of the Things Picket Fence Preview is Saying. Then Read the Truth.
Sellers, don't put Picket Fences between you and your buyers. Buyers, for truthful information about home buying, take one of the Champlain Housing Trust Workshops, you won't find the truth in a Picket Fence Preview. Many buyers and sellers I've worked with won't work with Picket Fence Preview because of their misleading statements. There are many good FSBO services out there, and you can find better and more professional alternatives to Picket Fence Preview. I offer you just a sample of recent Picket Fence propaganda, misleading statements, and outright lies. Letter exchange between Picket Fence Preview and a seller.In this email exchange William Supple, the owner of Picket Fence Preview, tells a seller that real estate agents won't tell clients the average time on market for a property. This is simply untrue. Real Estate agents routinely discuss Days-on-Market (DOM) with clients. Its such an outlandish "mistake" on the part of Picket Fences, that I can't imagine how a real estate agent could do their job without discussing DOM. Of course the seller in this email exchange went with a professional agent. ----- Original Message ----- From: William F. Supple, Jr., Ph. D. To: WB Sent: Tuesday, May 09, 2006 8:58 AM Subject: Re: question on timing
We calculate
Northern Vt statistics - which includes Montpelier.
Bill WB wrote: Hi Bill, I live in Montpelier and am wondering what the average turn around time for sales in Montpelier has been in the past 2 months. Do you have any information
Email sent by Picket Fence Preview to FSBO seller listing on craigslist.comHow does Picket Fences find new homes to sell? Well this email was sent to a seller advertising on Craigslist.com. Its ironic that the rationalizations for using Picket Fence Preview rather than criagslist.com could also be arguments for using a real estate agent rather than Picket Fences. I quote the email as written, poor grammar and all. Picket Fences wasn't able to substantiate their June and July statistics and the sellers decided to sell through a professional agent. Hello Private Homeseller, I’m Bill Supple from Picket Fence Preview, Vermont’s For Sale by Owner Magazine. You probably have one in your possession now. Picket Fence works because the upscale presentation of your property in full color appeals to buyers and because you’re spending money to advertise buyers know you are motivated to actually sell. Unfortunately, most of the people on free websites like this one, are not really interested in selling. Since it costs nothing to place the ad, most properties here are overpriced and sellers motivated to move only if they can find a naive buyer to buy their overpriced property. Buyers may look here initially then learn that the sellers are unrealistic, or not motivated. Then the buyers look elsewhere, usually in Picket Fences. PLUS, look at all the hidden realtor listings that buyers have to sift through - if that doesn’t discourage them nothing will! I’m not implying that your property is overpriced or undesirable, only that the company you keep on this website is hurting your chances of selling because many of the properties here unfortunately fit that description. In June and July of 2006 PFP sellers were waiting only 21.6 and 32 days in June & July, respectively, until they received an offer. PLUS, they were receiving 99% of their asking price. These figures are virtually the same a during the hot sellers market of 2004 & 2005. So for PFP sellers it’s still a seller’s market. Anyway, you’re in the right frame of mind to sell your own home and avoid nasty commissions. You may just want to re-think your advertising strategy. Please consult our website for info or see it in the magazine. Buyer-Agents and Buyer-Agency Agreements.Vermont and most other states in the country drafted regulations allowing buyer-broker agency agreements to protect buyers by providing them with the same rights of representation already provided to home sellers. I think it's more than a bit unethical for Picket Fence Preview to try and portray buyer-broker contracts designed to give consumers protections as contracts not in the best interest of the buyer. If you've you looked through Picket Fence magazine or website you've more than likely come across a dishonest statement like:
Now that the
market has become dominated by Picket Fence Preview
properties, It was when I first read "dominated by Picket Fence Preview properties" that I considered that maybe the owner isn't trying to misrepresent, maybe he just doesn't understand the real estate market. Or maybe you've come across this: Many "standard" buyer broker agreements specify that you will work with that particular agent exclusively, and worse, that you owe a fee to the agent regardless of whether he or she shows you the property that you end up buying, and even worse still, that you can't get out of the contract unless it is "mutually agreed upon" by both parties. Don't sign this! If you do, you are signing away your right to look at properties with other brokers as well as to look at private sale properties on your own. I've actually reported these statements to the real estate commission because of their misleading nature. The truth is that you can have an agent represent you for whatever properties you wish. In fact one of our "standard" contracts specifically states that the buyer can find and pursue properties alone. Its called the Exclusive Buyer-Agent Agreement, and Picket Fence Preview won't tell you about it. They also won't tell you that over 80% of FSBO sellers end up selling their home through a real estate agent. Picket Fence Preview: All the News That's Fit to Print?Well the Vermont Supreme Court didn't think so. Did you know that the owners of Picket Fence Preview tried to avoid paying taxes by saying that the magazine was a newspaper with "at least 10% of its printed material" consisting "of news of general or community interest, community notices, editorial comment, or articles by different authors.” They claimed that paying taxes would violate their “constitutional rights.” Fortunately the Vermont Supreme Court believed otherwise, and most people believe that some standard of truth is necessary if you're to call yourself a newspaper. Educate Yourself.Champlain Housing has a great home buying workshop that covers the ins and outs, ups and downs of home buying. Visit http://www.getahome.org/ for truthful information.
Examples:Just one example, the Bransons tried for months through Picket Fences without success. I listed her home for more than she was selling through Picket Fence Preview and had two full-price offers in 10 days. (Supple has since removed their ad and replaced the page with one suggesting I'm making up the truth: http://www.picketfencepreview.com/bransons.htm.)
Pike, I would like
to take this opportunity to thank you for the
work that you have completed on my home sale.
You have shown me that if you want to sell your
home in a very professional and timely manner
that using a realtor is really important. We
found that using picket fences is not effective
because most of the folks that came through my
home using the ad and the internet were really
not serious buyers. Using a realtor get the
exposure that is needed and "weeds out" the
folks that are just the peepers. We put a lot of
work into the picket fences method and it did
not work. In my opinion it was money wasted. I
would never refer anyone to use a FSBO method
again. We found that using a realtor to get the
job done is well worth the money.
My Original ad was put on the internet page on April 9th, 2007 A few days later I noticed I had a couple of typos in the ad and called them to make the corrections. I talked with a woman there and she was very nice. At that time I talked about how I had noticed other folks had put open house information in their ads and thought maybe I should do that to. So, a couple days later I called and got Bill on the phone, and we discussed several options on open house information and what worked and what didn’t work in his opinion. We together decided that I would have the open houses on April 22nd and May 6th. I was under the understanding that the dates would be displayed on the internet and in the monthly book. I thought the book was coming out on the 16th or 18th but later found out that was the date for the final proof for end of month print.
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Jack Associates
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Pike Porter
Vermont Real Estate Agent
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