Buying · Resources · Ready in 90 Series
Ready in 90 · Part 4: Find your agent, understand your market, and define what you're actually looking for.
Before you tour a single home, choose your agent deliberately, understand what you're signing, study your market, and write down what actually matters.
The series
This is Part 4 of a 5-part series. Part 1 — Know Your Numbers, Part 2 — Get Pre-Approved, and Part 3 — Know Your Real Budget are all live, and Part 5 — Write an Offer, Protect Yourself, Close completes the series.
- Part 1Know Your Numbers
- Part 2Get Pre-Approved and Shop Lenders
- Part 3Know Your Real Budget
- Part 4Find Your Agent, Understand Your Market, Define What You Want— you are here
- Part 5Write an Offer, Protect Yourself, Get to Closing
The financial foundation is built. You know your credit, your DTI, your savings, and your real budget — and you have a pre-approval letter from a lender you actually vetted.
Now it's time to build the team and the search strategy. And the order matters more than most buyers realize: agent first, market second, wish list third, showings last. Reverse any of those and you end up making an emotional decision with incomplete information.
This week is about doing it in the order that prevents the most common buyer mistakes.
General educational content. Agreement terms, market conditions, and representation practices vary. Speak with a licensed Realtor about your specific situation.
Section 1
Choosing your buyer's agent.
Most buyers don't choose an agent. They inherit one — from a sign call, a listing app, a cousin who got licensed last spring. That's not a decision, it's a default, and it's a consequential one. Your agent shapes which homes you see, what you understand about their condition and value, how your offer is structured, and whether someone in the room is willing to slow you down when slowing down is the right call.
Look for genuine local market knowledge first. A useful test: ask something specific about your target area and watch whether they answer or reach for their phone. An agent who works Nephi, Mona, Levan, or Santaquin regularly can tell you which streets flood in a wet spring, which subdivisions have well versus city water, and what a given floor plan tends to sell for — without looking it up. Then look for responsive, clear communication, and demonstrated willingness to deliver honest assessments. If you're using a USDA, VA, or FHA loan, ask directly how many of those they've closed; those programs have appraisal and property-condition requirements that catch inexperienced agents off guard.
Interview more than one. Not because the first agent is bad, but because you have no baseline until you've heard two people answer the same question. The difference between a general answer and a specific one becomes obvious the moment you have something to compare it to — and a second conversation costs you thirty minutes against a purchase that will define your finances for a decade.
Bring the same four questions to each conversation. They're not trick questions; they're designed to surface how someone thinks under a little pressure.
How long have you worked in this specific market?
Can you walk me through a recent transaction from offer to closing?
How do you handle a situation where a buyer falls in love with an overpriced home?
What would you tell me if I were about to make a mistake?
"You want the agent who will tell you the truth before you sign — not the one who agrees with everything you say to avoid an uncomfortable conversation."
— Dana Hoyt, Summit Keys
Section 2
The Buyer-Broker Agreement.
The Buyer-Broker Agreement is the written contract between you and a brokerage that defines the representation relationship. Since August 2024 — a direct result of the NAR settlement — a written buyer agreement has to be in place before an agent tours homes with you. It's not fine print invented by your agent; it's now the standard entry point to representation, and it exists to make the terms explicit instead of assumed.
The agreement covers four things worth reading closely: the services the brokerage will provide, the compensation and how it's paid, the duration of the agreement, and the property types and geographic area it applies to. Duration matters — a two-week agreement and a twelve-month agreement are very different commitments. So does scope: some agreements cover any property in the state, others are narrowed to a county or a price band.
Compensation is the piece buyers most often misunderstand. The agreement states what your agent is owed; it does not decide who ultimately pays it. In Utah's purchase contract, a buyer can ask the seller to cover the buyer's agent fee as a negotiated term of the offer — and sellers frequently agree, because a workable offer is still a workable offer. If the seller covers less than the agreed amount, the difference falls to you, which is exactly why you want the number understood before you're mid-negotiation. I wrote a full breakdown of how that works here: can the seller pay your buyer's agent fee in Utah?
Section 3
Understanding your market before you tour.
Study recent closed sales in your target area — and study sold prices, not list prices. List price is a seller's opening position. Sold price is what a buyer with a lender and an appraiser behind them actually paid. The gap between the two, across a handful of recent comparable sales, tells you whether homes in that area are closing above asking, at asking, or with room to negotiate. That single piece of homework changes how your first offer is written.
Know the average days on market for your price band and area. In a fast market, hesitation is expensive: the home you want to sleep on is under contract by Monday. In a slower market, patience is leverage — a listing sitting at sixty days has a seller who is thinking about price differently than they were in week one. Same house, same buyer, completely different negotiation, and the number that tells you which one you're in is days on market.
Then go visit. Drive your target neighborhoods at different times of day, because 9am on a Saturday and 5:30pm on a Tuesday are two different places. Traffic patterns, street parking, noise, dogs, how the light falls, whether the road ices in the shade — none of that shows up in listing photos. If you're weighing a few towns, the town guides on the blog are a good place to start before you spend your Saturday driving.
Section 4
Must-haves vs. nice-to-haves.
Write this list down before the first showing. Not in your head — on paper, in two separate columns. The reason is simple: a beautifully staged home is a persuasion machine, and the moment you are standing in one, your definition of "must-have" becomes negotiable in real time. A list written in a calm kitchen on a Tuesday is the version of you that should be making this decision.
Must-haves are genuine non-negotiables — the things that, if missing, make the home wrong regardless of how much you like it. Bedroom count. Bathroom count. Location parameters and commute requirements. A size minimum. Physical accessibility needs. Any deal-breaking condition, like a foundation issue you're not equipped to take on or a septic system at the end of its life. If you'd still buy the house without it, it isn't a must-have.
Nice-to-haves are everything else: architectural style, an updated kitchen, a big backyard, a dedicated office, an open floor plan, specific neighborhood features. These matter — they're just not structural to the decision, and most of them can be added later. During showings, evaluate must-haves first and nice-to-haves second, never the reverse. The quartz counters are not allowed to vote until the bedroom count has.
Must-Haves
Non-negotiable
- Bedroom count
- Bathroom count
- Location parameters
- Commute requirements
- Size minimum
- Any deal-breaking conditions
Nice-to-Haves
Preferences
- Specific architectural style
- Updated kitchen
- Large backyard
- Home office setup
- Open floor plan
- Specific neighborhood features
"Buyers who walk into their first showing without this list make decisions based on how a home looks and feels in the moment. Buyers who have the list make decisions based on what actually matters to their life."
— Dana Hoyt, Summit Keys
Section 5
A simple checklist for this week.
Seven things. None of them require money, and all of them are easier now than they will be once you're emotionally attached to a specific house.
Week 4 — build the team and the plan
- 01Research at least two agents who specialize in your target market
- 02Schedule a brief conversation with each — treat it as an interview
- 03Choose your agent based on knowledge, communication, and honesty
- 04Read and understand the Buyer-Broker Agreement before you sign
- 05Pull recent closed sales data for your target area and price range
- 06Visit your target neighborhoods at different times of day
- 07Write your must-have list and your nice-to-have list — separately
Frequently asked
Agent and market FAQs.
Ready to interview someone?
Bring the four questions. I'll answer all of them.
No pressure and no agreement required to have the conversation — interview me the same way you'd interview anyone else, and we'll both find out whether it's a fit.
Continue the series
All parts of the Ready in 90 series live on the resources page.
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Part 3 — Know Your Real BudgetLegal note
General educational content. Buyer-Broker Agreement requirements and terms vary. Agent selection, market research approaches, and negotiation strategies vary by transaction and market. Speak with a licensed Realtor about your specific situation. Dana Hoyt is a licensed Realtor® in Utah with Summit Keys Real Estate and Real Brokerage, LLC — The Perry Group.
