Before The Key · Page three of the method

The Right Agent Match

Your brief comes back with the areas that match your life. Then we go find the agent for those areas.

You get one name, the homes that agent closed in your areas, and the part of the job they are weakest at. Every step is written out below.

Build My Relocation Brief Ask a Local

Call and ask a local, or send the question in writing. Either way a person who lives here answers it.

The problem with the search you already ran

Search “best realtor” and your destination city. You’ll get three names.

What that page tells you

Those are the three who paid for that spot. The page doesn’t tell you whether any of them has ever sold a house on the streets you picked, or whether they got their license eight years ago or eight months ago.

What happens next

A buyer moving to Nashville found one that way. Strong reviews, pleasant on video. After she was already under contract she found out the agent had been licensed eight months and had never worked with a buyer from another state.

Deadlines slipped. Problems came up that nobody had warned her about. Nashville was full of agents who handle relocations every week and she never knew they existed.

The missing piece

Normally none of this would touch you, because somebody you trust would give you a name. That is how 43% of buyers and two thirds of sellers get their agent.

You moved away from everybody who could have given you one.

Here is what we do instead of that missing recommendation.

The Right Agent Match, five stages

Same steps, same order, every client. The agent at the end is different, because the answers are.

Stage one

We write down what your agent has to be able to do.

We turn your answers into a list of things the agent has to be able to do. The list is different for every client because the answers are.

Somebody moving to protect family dinners needs a different agent from somebody moving for room to breathe whose week runs through a trailhead and a Costco.

Why this stage exists

Because agents are good at different things, and the same agent can be right for one client and wrong for the next one.

What breaks without it

You get matched on sales volume, which is what agent-matching services actually sort by. A big sales number doesn’t tell you whether that person can protect the thing you are moving for.

Stage two

We check the sales record, not the reputation.

We pull the agent’s sales record and look at it by address, to see which homes they have closed inside your areas. If they haven’t closed inside your areas in the past twelve months, they are out, however good the profile looks.

Then we confirm the license is current, how long they have held it, and whether real estate is their full-time job.

Why this stage exists

Because an agent’s profile page is written by the agent. The reviews come from clients that agent chose to ask. Neither one tells you whether the person has driven your streets at five o’clock.

What breaks without it

You end up with an agent who is well known across the city and guessing on your street.

Stage three

Every agent left answers the same interview, using your brief.

We give each of them your brief and your areas and ask which one they would push back on, and why.

Then we give them three homes currently for sale inside those areas and ask what each one should sell for and what is wrong with it.

Then we call buyers they closed with last year who were in another state at the time. We pick those buyers out of the sales record ourselves, so nobody hands us a list of friendly references.

Why this stage exists

Because this is where we find out whether they know your streets or just the city. Ask an agent to price a real house on a real street and you know within ten seconds.

What breaks without it

An agent who says every area looks great and all three houses are lovely sounds easy to work with on a call and costs you twenty thousand dollars on a house that was priced too high.

Who doesn’t get past this stage

Anyone who can’t name a single fault in a house. Anyone who prices a house by reading the online estimate out loud. Anyone whose out-of-state buyers say they spent the deal waiting on a reply.

Stage four

One name, with the sales record and the weak spot.

You get one agent. With them you get the list of homes they closed in your areas, the reason we picked this person, what they are best at, and what they are not as good at.

If the agent we picked negotiates hard, runs a tight schedule, and answers in three-word texts, you hear that from us before you meet them.

Why this stage exists

Because you can’t judge a person if you have only been shown the good half. We tell you both halves of a neighborhood in your brief, and we do the same with a person.

Why one name

You already had a list of names you couldn’t tell apart. That is the problem that brought you here, and handing you five profiles hands it straight back.

Stage five

The call, then the houses.

You talk to somebody who read your brief before the call started, so they open with your life instead of with listings. Nothing is signed on that call.

If you want a different agent after it, say so and you get one.

Why it is last

Because your areas are already decided and the requirements are already written. The only thing left to find out is whether you want to work with this person.

How we break a tie

What happens when two agents each have half of what you need.

The collision

Two of your requirements will collide. The hardest negotiator in the metro has never closed a sale in your areas. The agent who knows your areas street by street has worked with two out-of-state buyers instead of twenty.

The rule

The Right Move Process settles a bigger yard against a shorter commute by asking which one you are moving for. We pick agents the same way.

The sales record inside your areas beats the citywide sales number every time, because an agent guessing on your streets is guessing with your money. After that, we go back to what your brief said this move has to fix, and the agent who can protect that wins.

The floor

What every agent has to clear, whatever your brief says.

Nobody reaches Stage 3 without all of it.

What we require	What it protects	How we check it
A record of what they have negotiated.	The price, the repair credits after inspection, the closing costs, the gap when a house appraises low, and a closing date that lines up with the sale of the home you are leaving.	We compare what their listings asked to what they closed at, and we ask their past buyers what credits they got.
They can price a house on your streets.	Paying twenty thousand too much is invisible until the day you sell.	We hand them three homes for sale in your areas and ask what each should sell for.
They keep the contract dates.	Option periods, financing and appraisal deadlines, earnest money. Miss one and you lose your leverage or your deposit.	Calls with past clients and their sales history.
They can read an inspection report.	Which findings are normal for a house that age in that climate, which one is a five-figure repair, and which one you take back to the seller.	Interview and calls with past clients.
They have closed deals for buyers in another state.	Same-day video walkthroughs, standing in at the inspection, signing with a remote notary, writing an offer while you are nine hundred miles away.	Their sales record, checked by address.
They give you a reply time in hours, in your time zone.	Good listings in a tight market come and go over a weekend.	They commit to it in writing and we check it against what clients tell us.
They will tell you not to buy a house.	They only get paid when you buy one.	The Stage 3 interview and calls with past clients.
Licensed, in good standing, and doing this full time.	Eight months of licensure looks the same as eight years on a profile page.	State license lookup, checked again on a schedule.

From your brief to their job

Four examples of how your answers turn into what we require from the agent.

You said

You have to get to a specialist hospital, a rowing club, and one specific school every week.

Your agent has to

Know which of your areas gets you to all three inside your driving limit, and which one only works if the highway is clear.

You said

This move is about getting your evenings back.

Your agent has to

Tell you when a bigger kitchen costs you eight more minutes each way, because that is forty extra hours in the car this year.

You said

You are leaving because of the weather.

Your agent has to

Answer how many months a year you would actually be outside doing the thing you named, from that specific area.

You said

You are starting a social life from scratch.

Your agent has to

Tell you where that happens in your areas and who runs it. Knowing the local clubs, leagues, and groups that take in new arrivals is part of the job for an agent who works with people relocating.

Five things

What gets an agent removed from our roster.

Starting the area search over after you already decided.
Showing you a house outside your areas without telling you first that it is outside them.
Answering “what is wrong with this house” with “nothing.”
Letting a day go by without answering because you are three time zones away.
A fee showing up at closing that you had not seen before you signed.

Any one of them, no matter what deal they were about to close.

Before we give them your name

What your agent agrees to in writing.

Read your brief before the first call, and start with your life instead of with listings.
Work inside the areas you decided on, and say out loud that a house is outside them before showing it to you.
Tell you what a house costs you in the same breath as what it gives you.
Tell you what you need to see in person, and shoot the video that lets you check it from where you are now.
Show you the reasoning before an offer goes out, not after.
Put their fee in writing before you sign anything, and explain what the agreement means in that state.
Answer inside the time they committed to, on your clock.
Never use a deadline that is not real.

If we picked the wrong person.

Ask for a different agent and you get one. You don’t have to give a reason, you don’t have to have a complaint, and “something felt off” is a complete answer.

We tell the agent the match ended. We don’t tell them anything you didn’t say.

The agent who closes your purchase is the one who pays us, so a match you walk away from earns us nothing. Sending you whoever was convenient is the fastest way for us to make zero dollars.

The fee

How we get paid.

When your purchase closes, your agent pays us [X]% of the commission they earned. That is the whole business model on this side.

It doesn’t raise your price, and it doesn’t come out of your side of the table. It doesn’t buy the agent a spot on our roster either, because no agent can pay us to be your match.

You hear that number from us before you meet your agent. Sellers who used the biggest company in this business have said publicly that they never knew a 33% referral fee existed at all.

The buyer agreement

What you will be asked to sign, and when.

The requirement

Since August 2024, you sign a written agreement with an agent before they can tour homes with you. That agreement has to state what they get paid as an actual number: a percentage, a flat fee, or a formula.

What’s negotiable

The number is negotiable. So is the length, and a first agreement doesn’t need to run six months. Your offer can also ask the seller to pay it.

When you sign

Depends on the state. Texas wants the agreement signed before the agent does substantive work for you. Alabama and Mississippi let you tour first.

We walk you through this before you meet your agent, so you are never reading a fee clause for the first time with somebody sitting across from you waiting.

The other side

The house you are leaving.

Most people moving across the country are running two sales at once, and the closing date on the new house sets the deadline for the old one.

We run the same steps on that end, and we check those agents on the three things sellers say matter most: how they plan to market the house, what they will price it at in a market you are about to stop paying attention to, and whether they can close it near the date you close on the other side.

Your two agents talk to each other. The gap between those two closings is where families end up in a hotel with a dog.

Your questions

Questions to ask the agent we send you.

How many homes have you closed inside these areas in the past twelve months?
How many of your buyers last year were living in another state when they wrote their offer?
What did the last three houses you sold near here list for, and what did they close at?
What is wrong with this house?
Which of my areas would you push back on, and why?
What is your fee, who pays it, and what happens if I want out of the agreement?

Ask ours these. We already did, and you should hear the answers in their own words.

What we will not promise.

We build the search around the life you are moving for, every time. That is the only absolute on this site.

Nobody can promise you a specific house or a specific market. Anyone who promises you that is promising something they can’t see.

If we don’t have anyone in your areas.

If no agent in your areas passes all of this, we tell you, and we don’t match you. You won’t get handed the closest available person and told it’s a fit.

We’ll tell you what we can do instead, and the brief is still yours to use.

This is what your agent reads before your first call.

Placeholder. Replace with a real Relocation Brief, name and address redacted, legible at page width.

Questions

Frequently asked.

Does this cost me anything?

No. Your agent pays us after closing.

Do I have to use the agent you send?

No, and swapping doesn’t require an explanation.

Why one name instead of five?

You already had a list of names you couldn’t tell apart. That is why you are here.

Can I see who it is before I give you my information?

You can read every step, every disqualifier, and a real brief first. The name comes after the areas, because the areas are what we pick the name for.

What if I already have an agent there?

Keep them. Take the brief anyway, give them your areas, and ask them the six questions above.

What if my areas change after the call?

The requirements change with them, and so does the agent.

Do you do this for sellers?

Yes, on the home you are leaving.

What if my agent stops answering?

Tell us. It is one of the five things that gets an agent removed.

Your life decided the areas. The areas decide the agent.

Every step is above. It starts with the brief.

Build My Relocation Brief Ask a Local

Call and ask a local, or send the question in writing. Either way a person who lives here answers it.