brokers to avoid?

i had similar neg experiences with that real estate agency a number of years ago. however, in this 'nabe and market, i don't think it is too uncommon for a broker to request such info before investing his or her time. as far as suggestions go, i had several good experiences over the past decade or so with berkeley heights on 7th and berkeley. specifically, with a broker named alan whose last name escapes me at the moment, but is a solid long-time ph resident. also, with a latina woman there.

good luck, it's rough out there!!

Watch out for the guy named Mateo who posts on Craigs' list... huge nice looking apartments but nowhere near the neighborhoods he says they're in.

I actually had a pretty good experience with marjorie. From previous posts on these boards, it seems as though she's hit or miss, though. She was the only person I found who was listing apartments in Prospect Heights that were actually in Prospect Heights.

teddyballgame wrote: Watch out for the guy named Mateo who posts on Craigs' list... huge nice looking apartments but nowhere near the neighborhoods he says they're in.

I actually got my apartment through Mateo. He does have some problems with listing the correct neighborhoods, but he also had a lot of stuff to show me and was willing to drive me around.

I rented an apartment from Marjorie almost 4 years ago...The apartment was fantastic, but she neglected to tell me how noisy the apartment was. After I rented the apartment, I called her back to complain about the noise (at the time, I was hoping to kill the deal...too late!) and she never called me back. Besides the noise, the apartment was a totally renovated, brand new, very large 1 bedroom...for 1050! At the time, that was still alot of Washington ave...I came to LOVE the apartment and my landlords. A few years later, I approached Marjorie about buying in the neighborhood and when I told her my price range, she never called me back..said there was NOTHING for me. Now, whenever she sees me, she asks if I'm selling my apt...I wouldn't give her the listing if she was the last broker standing...

The two brokers that i've dealt with in this neighborhood were Mateo and Marjorie. Mateo showed us a few things that were right where he said they were, although he did seem to list things that were no longer available...we looked a duplex with a little "deck" (read:roof) on Washington, and then a floor-through on St. Mark's in a brownstone. He was really nice, drove us around in his car, and even returned our credit check money with our deposit on the St. Mark's place when he couldn't get the owner to come down to our price range - he was honest enough to let us know that he hadn't even run the credit check, and gave the cash back! I think he's got real set-ups for shares, and moved a TON of people into those townhouses on underhill and bergen. I think you have to be a bit savvy, but I'd recommend him (and have, in fact, in the past.)

As for Marjorie, the only reason we're in our apartment - which I LOVE - is because of her. She seriously has her finger on the neighborhood, seems like she knows everything and everyone. When Stuart and I walked in to fill out our application (that seems pretty normal to me, btw) she asked where I lived. I told her at 446 crazy lane, right around the corner from her office, and she was like, "oh yeah, 4th floor? with those two other girls?" Like, whoa. She showed us a ton of places and was totally helpful even though she kept assuring us that if we brought our price range up, we'd do better. She was a hardass, for sure, and hassled me about having a guarantor (I was waiting tables and getting paid off the books at the time), but when it came down to choosing between us and these two guys from Spain who had just moved to New York, she totally went to bat for us and put in a good word with the landlord, even though I didn't have a "real" job. There was then some runaround with the key situation, but mostly because my super is a little crazy and maybe a tweaker. All in all, I'm totally satisfied with my experience with Marjorie...she doesn't fuck around, tells it like it is, and is totally fair. I feel like she's a great resource for apartments that are actually in prospect heights, if staying on this side of washington is important to you.

Subject: Broker experience

Hi! I had not so great broker experiences in Brooklyn, but by far the worst was with Marjorie. She is absolutely insane. She told me that she will "never ever rent to Nigerians or people who work in the legal field". That is total discrimination right there. My roommate and I had an apartment lined up that was actually a place Marjorie owned on Park Pl. It wasn't that great of an apartment and she was renting it for $1700. By the time push came to shove, she raised the going price to $1850 out of nowhere. My roommate needed to have her parents sign as guarantors. When my roomies father listed his income as "substantial" on the form (because of not wanting to disclose his income, not the brightest move on his part, but forgivable one would think), Marjorie completely flipped out. She called both my roommies and my cell phones, left viscious messages telling us off. My roommies father called her to try and discuss the problem and Marjorie screamed his ear off and then hung up on him.
I have now found a great apartment right in PH and there was no broker involved. I will NEVER talk to that crazy woman again. I should have trusted my instincts when I felt like I was about to cry the second time talking to her when she made me basically beg for her to give me the apartment. I knew something was not right at the time, but I was so desperate for a place that I thought that is what you have to do in the NYC area. I promised myself that if I feel that way ever again from a broker to leave immediatly. The whole thing sucked, big time.
For me, the best thing I did was visit multiple brokers and just see what they had to offer. Shop around...

Subject: Re: brokers to avoid?

qtrain wrote: Today my girlfriend set up an appointment with a broker (Marjorie Thompson realty) to view a place "on Eastern Parkway, near Washington". It wasn't on Eastern Parkway (it was above Islands), and she refused to show it (right across the street from her office!) unless we filled out an application (the kind that asks for SSNs and bank account numbers) so she could determine if we were "qualified". I was not feeling the love, and definitely not feeling one month's to be treated rudely. We walked out.

Are there other brokers in the area I should be avoiding?

whoa. was it a rental??
I had that kind of issue when I was looking to buy a place (are you pre-approved for a mortgage? where are the papers?) but I've NEVER had that issue with rentals. that's not cool at all. she is so weird!!

Subject: Re: brokers to avoid?

alafairnadia wrote: [quote=qtrain]Today my girlfriend set up an appointment with a broker (Marjorie Thompson realty) to view a place "on Eastern Parkway, near Washington". It wasn't on Eastern Parkway (it was above Islands), and she refused to show it (right across the street from her office!) unless we filled out an application (the kind that asks for SSNs and bank account numbers) so she could determine if we were "qualified". I was not feeling the love, and definitely not feeling one month's to be treated rudely. We walked out.

Are there other brokers in the area I should be avoiding?

whoa. was it a rental??
I had that kind of issue when I was looking to buy a place (are you pre-approved for a mortgage? where are the papers?) but I've NEVER had that issue with rentals. that's not cool at all. she is so weird!!

There are some agencies that work to benefit the landlord. I'm thinking this Marjorie character was doing waht she was asked in order to receive a commission.
Some landlords are afraid to put someone into their place that has either avoided the monthly burden of paying their rent or have been pains in the rear when they're asked to move on.
Your SSN links you to all these and much more

I had a nice experience with Mark from Mark A. Williams Realty. I think he deals all over the city but he found a great place for me in PH and was super pleasant to work with. He did charge a one month fee, though.

Phone 718 390 7117

Subject: Re: Broker experience

Sweet Caroline wrote:
I should have trusted my instincts when I felt like I was about to cry the second time talking to her when she made me basically beg for her to give me the apartment.

This doesn't surprise me at all since I a.) was totally manipulated by one of her brokers into giving her my listing, b.) received WAY below par service with almost NO showing and c.) was SCREAMED at psychotically when I called Marjorie to complain. Those people are truly sick, sick, sick, have NO integrity and are bad at selling real estate.

Subject: TO WEED OUT THE REAL RENTERS

MOST ASK FOR APPLICATIONS AND TO GET PAID IF U GO BEHIND BROKERS BACK

MATEO HAS SCAMMED ALOT OF DEPOSITS FROM PEOPLE

WHERES HIS OFFICE OR WHATS HIS LAST NAME HES SHADY

Could you use regular capitalization in future posts, please? Most people perceive using all capitals as rude--it's like yelling. Thanks.

what? again, I'm not her defender but this is a really bizarre post. do you have a personal grudge?

I'd reccomend Mateo. Just got an apartment through him. There's also economic opportunities with Mateo. He'll pay you a grand if you can find him a wife.

Subject: recent experiences with a few local brokers

So after the apartment search thing, my brain was so fried that I accidentaly posted this under a mortgage broker message, forgetting that after all that hassle, we didn't actually own anything! So here are our reviews of a few rental brokers we met earlier this month. I agree with some of the above postings about Marjorie Thompson, she annoyed me a lot and my boyfriend really hates her.

moved from http://brooklynian.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=33642

daya wrote: In case it's helpful to anyone else looking for places, here is some of our experience with local brokers:

Marjorie Thompson of Washington Realty has a lot of apartments in Prospect Heights and Crown Heights. She seems to be the exclusive broker for several buildings in ideal locations close to the Brooklyn Museum. She was friendly but seemed too busy to care about helping us. We thought we had an 11 am appointment with her but she spent all day ignoring our calls and it was 7pm before we were able to see anything. During our viewings she took her friends (coworkers?) along to continue a gossip fest and spent a lot of time telling us how much better her own apartment was than anything she was showing us. My boyfriend thinks she sux (Boyfriend says: expect her to sweet talk your girlfriend and ignore you; "I hear Beyonce is buying a condo next door"). If we had rented an apt from her at around $1600 we would have had to pay her around a $2400 broker fee. What the *&*$* did she do for us to earn $2400!?

Alan Marks of Brooklyn Properties was a much better broker. We didn't end up renting the apt he showed us (it was a pretty nice 1.5br on Vanderbilt and Bergen at $1600, right above a hardware store and is probably still available as of 8 Aug) but we felt like he was no bullshit. He seemed honest, hardworking and made time to show us the apt right away and we can recommend him to anyone needing to use a broker.

Nathan at 718.314.1448 (sorry I don't remember his last name or if there was a company name) was a very friendly, attentive broker who returned all calls promtly, scheduled a viewing right away and met us on time, was honest about the listings he had and we felt like he respected us as his clients since we would have been the ones paying the fee. We didn't like the apt he showed us but we did like him.

We left messages for Omar of Alta realty in response to his ads but had no return calls over four days.

Someone called Vago realty has a for rent sign at Dean and Underhill but they never returned any phone messages either.

We avoided calling Rapid Realty because there were several craigslist postings outlining very bad experiences with them.