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Use of Agents in Boston Market Increasing

Are sellers more likely to use a real estate agent in a down market? Quite a few of you have argued lately that it's easier than ever before to sell a home without the help of an agent, largely thanks to the Internet. But as the pool of buyers has dwindled, it appears that a higher share of sellers are turning to real estate agents.

I compared two sets of data on annual home sales in Massachusetts. The Warren Group includes all sales. The Massachusetts Association of Realtors includes only sales involving a real estate agent. In theory, the share of Warren Group sales reported by MAR should be roughly the share of sales involving an agent.

Here are the numbers over the last decade:

Year---Warren---MAR---Share
1998---64815---50401---77.76%
1999---65716---49338---75.08%
2000---59542---46302---77.76%
2001---56366---44514---78.97%
2002---57192---46770---81.78%
2003---58688---49040---83.56%
2004---64568---50561---78.31%
2005---58627---48922---83.45%
2006---50322---43379---86.20%
2007---45339---41510---91.55%

The local housing boom began in the mid-1990s and peaked in 2005. As you can see, over the last two years -- as the market has fallen from that peak -- the share of sales involving an agent has surged past 90 percent of all sales.

The sales reported by MAR may involve an agent representing the buyer, but no agent representing the seller. But there is no reason to believe those proportions have changed over time, so the overall trend still is worth noting.

Boston.com Posted by Binyamin Appelbaum April 7, 2008 11:40 AM