Student’s award-winning paper examines real estate issue

April 2012

If you’re looking for a real estate agent to sell your home, you might be better off choosing someone who doesn’t have any properties of his or her own on the market, the results of a Longwood research study indicate.

Conducted by Longwood business student Brandon Caracciolo, the study showed that properties owned by real estate agents sell for more and are on the market longer than properties owned by agents’ clients. This could mean that agents’ interest in making money for themselves trumps their obligations to their clients, said Caracciolo.

“The Performance of Owner-Agent Properties during Volatile Economic Conditions” won a best paper award in January at the annual Clute Institute conference, an international conference devoted to business research.

“Brandon’s paper was the only one by a student at his session; the other four papers were presented by college professors,” said Dr. Bennie Waller, who directed the research project. “The number of students who even present papers at this conference is incredibly small.”

Caracciolo looked at the situation in which an owner-agent is trying to sell property he owns—not his primary residence but usually a vacation home or second home—in addition to properties owned by clients. Caracciolo found that, although there were no significant differences in selling price before the economic crisis, in the period after the crisis (2007-09), agent-owned properties on average sold for $7,603 more than comparable client properties.