How often do you think realtors collude with each other?

Most agents hate other agents because they think they are superior and others are lazy. Reality is, they're all lazy thieves

I believe there was some research to suggest that sellers agents aren't always interested in getting the most they can for a particular house.

They're more interested in a sure sale, and the extra work required for an additional 3% of 5 or 10k isn't worth it to them.

There is definitely some additional information passing between the agents, but not sure I would go so far as imply they are all colluding.

Only dealt with relators a handful of times. When I bought my condo, then 3 different times when I sold my condo. The first 2 times resulted in no offers. 3rd time, I was given an offer below my asking price. Agent asked my thoughts, and when I mentioned I thought it was low and wanted to see if we could split the difference. She told me the buyer put in her best offer and recently had another sale rejected for financing issues. She most likely doesn't get that information without discussing the possibilities of a higher offer with the other agent first; and she definitely didn't hold out for a higher commission because my market price was in line with neighboring condos that sold right before and shortly after mine.

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I agree. When we moved to our current area a couple years ago, we put an offer in on a house. We went a little above asking price. The next day, our realtor told us the sellers are asking several potential buyers to put in their best and final offer. Instead, we rescinded our offer and our realtor begged and pleaded to for us to keep it in since we had the best offer. I told her they should have taken it then, and how did she know what the offers are. We switched agents also.

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Had the same thing happen to us back in 2017. My wife's best friend was our agent, so she wasn't in on it, but we knew we were offering more than the house would appraise for and had cash on hand to make that work. Instead, they played a game, we pulled back, and they ended up having to accept a fully financed offer for $20k less than we offered.

You're selling a house, not a fricking cow at auction.

Absolutely this happens.

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they played a game, we pulled back, and they ended up having to accept a fully financed offer for $20k less than we offered.

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I just looked up the property records, and the house sold for $15k less than our offer. That makes me feel even better about it. In the end, we had our house built and have zero complaints.

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It's more important to get the deal finalized, otherwise they are making $0.

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That’s when you have to take advantage

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It’s in the agent’s best interest to get a fast, sure sale even though it is not for top dollar.

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if you’re letting the realtor take the lead you’re pretty naive

I can’t imagine it’s that bad on the typical houses around here. If they “squeeze” another $10k out of you on a $300k deal they only make an additional $300. Not worth the risk of losing the deal and risking their reputation over $9000 vs $9300.

Maybe it’s more prevalent on the mega deals in the very affluent areas, but I doubt it’s that widespread on your typical deals.

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Divorce lawyers do the same thing. They've worked out a loose framework for settlement on the golf course and drinks afterwards.

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A divorce lawyer would be incentivized to take every case to trial as they're just billing hourly. Getting people to settle helps them none. Yet almost all cases settle nonetheless. If you really want to spend an extra $30k in litigation to argue about the division of $20k, then I'm sure any divorce attorney would gladly oblige. So even if they are “settling a case in the golf course,” that’s prob the best for the parties and no so much for their attorneys' bottom lines