文档介绍：英文原文:
Buying a House and the Decision to Use a Real Estate Broker
Introduction
What is it that residential real estate brokers do and why would a home buyer engage their services? As is often the case, answering this question is not a simple task. Home buyers who acquire their house through a broker do not purchase just a house--they also obtain the services of the broker. In other words, these buyers are consuming a bundled good. One dimension of this good is lower search time, and thus lower search costs, associated with buying through a broker. Recent research (Baryla and Zumpano, 1995) suggests that choosing a broker improves the marginal efficiency of search, making it more likely that a buyer will find a satisfactory match earlier in the search process.
Buying through a broker also increases the supply of houses available to buyers, and provides buyers with information on the quality of different houses and the neighborhoods in which they are located. Brokers frequently help buyers identify sources of mortgage financing and property insurance, as well as assist buyers in recording the title.
All of these services suggest that brokers provide value added to buyers (in addition to providing a service to sellers), something that these buyers would be willing to pay for. Thus this bundle of services and the house that is purchased would, intuitively, be priced higher t