Ask for an introduction to an agent
This is the only page on The Cusp that asks you for anything, and it exists because a fair number of readers get to the end of the house material and want a name rather than more reading. If that is not you, nothing here is for you and the rest of the site does not change.
A great many people who reach this page should not be selling a house yet, or at all. An agent is the wrong first call if nothing is filed, if there is an automatic order in place that restricts what either of you can do with the property, or if the question you actually have is whether you could refinance and stay.
The house page sets out when not to call an agent, and it is the honest place to start. It is longer than this page and it earns us nothing.
The short version3 points · tap one to jump to it
- What happens when you send this — The reply usually comes within a day and is often a question rather than a name.
- How we are paid, in plain words — Those two counties are where she actually works; everywhere else in Connecticut and Florida is a referral like any other.
- Ask for an introduction — The more you say the better the introduction, but a one-line message is a perfectly good way to start.
In this subject 4
What happens when you send this
The short version3 points · tap one to jump to it
- What happens when you send this — The reply usually comes within a day and is often a question rather than a name.
- How we are paid, in plain words — Those two counties are where she actually works; everywhere else in Connecticut and Florida is a referral like any other.
- Ask for an introduction — The more you say the better the introduction, but a one-line message is a perfectly good way to start.
In this subject 4
Hyleri reads it herself
Not an assistant, not a system. The reply usually comes within a day and is often a question rather than a name.
If the answer is that you should wait, or that you need a lawyer or an accountant before you need an agent, that is the answer you will get.
Either she works with you, or she finds someone who can
In Fairfield County, Connecticut and Palm Beach County, Florida she may work with you directly. Everywhere else — including the rest of Connecticut and Florida — she introduces you to a local agent who has completed our divorce real estate training.
A small panel in each market — two to five depending on the size of the place, and the largest counties split into named sub-markets so a seat means the same thing everywhere — chosen before you asked rather than because they paid. Placement is not for sale on this site and never will be.
We are training agents across the country, county by county, and not every county has a panel yet. If you write from one that does not, the training for agents in your county is expedited and we tell you how long that is likely to take. What we do not do is hand you to somebody who has not done it. That is the whole reason the training exists, and it would be a strange thing to abandon at the first inconvenient moment.
- A license we checked ourselves, with the regulator. Not a screenshot they sent us. Looked up with the state agency that issued it, dated, and re-checked on that license’s own renewal date. Any unresolved disciplinary action is a no. Not a discussion.
- Six closed sales, from their own MLS records. At least three in each of the last two full calendar years. Deliberately a low bar: we are not looking for sales awards, we are excluding the agent who renewed a license and did nothing with it.
- 4.7 or better, across everywhere they are reviewed. All their review pages together, not their best one, and at least ten reviews so a perfect score from three clients does not count. An agent who has handled twenty divorce sales has collected a bad review; an agent with a spotless record has probably never handled one.
- The training, and its twenty questions. Sixteen of twenty to pass. Free, unlimited retakes, and nobody takes a referral from us having skipped it.
Then we check on you, not on them. We email you at seven days — did they get in touch, and how did it go — and again at six months. We ask you, because an agent who did not call will say they did. We also read the public deed record on any property we referred, which needs nobody’s cooperation.
None of that has run yet, because we have not made a referral yet. That is written in the future tense on purpose. The standards in full — published so you can check them, and so an agent who has not done these things cannot claim they have.
An agent you find yourself answers to their brokerage and their state regulator, and to nobody else. An agent we introduced answers to us as well.
We will email you at seven days and again at six months and ask two questions: did they get in touch, and how did it go. We will ask you, not them — an agent who did not call will say they did. We have not introduced anybody yet, so this has not run yet — it begins with the first introduction. What you tell us goes on their record. If the answers are bad enough they lose their place on the panel — and where it is serious, we strip the certification itself and stop referring anyone to them at all. Our lookup says so the same day, to anybody who asks. A place in a county is worth far more to an agent than any single sale, and the credential is worth more than the place, which is exactly why the question has teeth. We also read the public deed records on any property we referred, because a transfer of title is public and we do not need anybody’s cooperation to see one.
That is not a guarantee about how your sale will go and we will not dress it up as one. It is a second line of accountability that does not exist if you find somebody on your own, and it costs you nothing to use.
One thing it is not. The professional directory works the other way: everyone licensed is listed whether they have heard of us or not, and being listed is not a recommendation. We correct entries and we remove them on request, but we do not police the conduct of people we were never paid to introduce you to, and we are not going to pretend otherwise. Where we have an interest, we take responsibility for it.
You are introduced, and you are free to say no
An introduction is an email with three people on it. You are not committed to anybody, and if you do not like them you say so and that is the end of it.
Your details go to nobody until you have said yes to a particular person.
If you are an agent reading this rather than a seller: the training these introductions run on is free, and access is by request — Cusp Certified explains what it covers and how to ask for it.
How we are paid, in plain words
If you are introduced to another agent — anywhere outside Fairfield County, Connecticut and Palm Beach County, Florida — and that sale completes, that agent’s brokerage pays a referral fee out of their own commission — currently 30% of the commission on your side of the transaction — which travels through Compass, and Hyleri receives a share of it.
Three things follow, and they are the ones worth checking anywhere else you are offered an agent:
- It is paid out of the agent’s commission, not added to yours. You are charged nothing, and the commission you negotiate is between you and them.
- It is only paid if the house actually sells. Which means we earn something when a house sells and nothing when it does not — so the advice to wait, or not to sell, costs us money. We give it anyway, and the page that gives it comes first.
- It is a flat share of one transaction, not a per-client price. Nobody pays to be on the list, nobody pays for position, and no professional anywhere on this site has ever paid to appear.
In Fairfield County, Connecticut and Palm Beach County, Florida there is no referral fee, because she may be your agent herself and would be paid a commission by whoever sells the house. Those two counties are where she actually works; everywhere else in Connecticut and Florida is a referral like any other. That is a larger interest, not a smaller one, and it is the reason the “do not sell yet” advice is written down rather than left to a conversation.
Everything else about how The Cusp is paid is on one page, including the lines we have refused.
Ask for an introduction
Nothing here is required except a name, an email address and the state. The more you say the better the introduction, but a one-line message is a perfectly good way to start.