
If you are selling your home, or buying a property you want the best, right? After all you are going to trust a real estate professional with a lot of confidential information. How do you even start to pick an agent to represent you?
Well, there are a lot of ways to choose a pro, and I'll go over some of those tips in a later blog post. Right now, lets concentrate on step number 1.
Determine if your agent has a valid, active real estate license in the state in which you are buying or selling. This seems obvious doesn't it? Unfortunately many folks think that just because they know of an agent, or have used them in the past, they are still legitimately an agent.
In Hawaii, an easy way to find out if your agent of choice is licensed is to go to the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs (DCCA). The link for looking up a licencee is: http://pvl.ehawaii.gov/pvlsearch/app
Enter in the name of the agent(s) you are considering. The site will show if they are active, current, valid and in good standing. You can also search to see if there have been any complaints against the person or company.
For Real Estate Agents, there are different license codes for Brokers and Sales Agents. The screen shot above is showing my license status. In Hawaii we renew our licences every two years, the next expiration is on 12/31/2012.
You may want to keep this site handy, it also lists other licensed professionals from Appraisers, to Contractors, Dentists, Electricians and more.