I decided to sell my Condo in New York without using a broker. I listed my apartment for sale by owner on craigslist and I received a ton of responses from brokers. At first I would tell the brokers I'm not interested, but they all became more persistent. When I first listed my apartment I made a common mistake of listing my apartment for too much so I didn't see anyone interested in just looking, but I did get a lot of responses from brokers. I decided to let a Prudential Douglas Elliman Associate Broker come and take a look at my apartment for one of his clients. When he got there he was dying to show me a power point presentation on his little laptop. I said that I didn't have time since it was first thing in the morning before I started working. He said it would only take a minute and I asked him if his client would like it. He said that his client would love it but I'd have to sign a 5% exclusive contract with Prudential.. I told him to not waste my time and leave.

Over the course of the past 4 weeks for every craigslist posting in 'for sale by owner' I made, I'd get at least three e-mails and phone calls from a Prudential Douglas Elliman Associate Broker. Now heres the sleezy part, most of the time they didn't even read my craigslist posting. Just found my phone number and cold called me. Some of them would send an e-mail out like they knew me and I would get "How are things coming along with the sale? Any solid offers yet?" from someone I never talked to before. Sent to me 3 times over for every different craigslist posting I had.

Here are some of the stories they would cold call me and waste my time with,
"Oh hey I was going along craigslist and your name seemed familiar, were you the person in that building I was selling the apartment for last year?"
"I'm on the Prudential top sellers team and they just moved me to New York from Florida"
"I've got someone interested in buying your apartment you just have to agree to sign an exclusive with us before I can bring them by to your apartment."
"What's the lowest you would take for the property? I have someone who is ready to take it off your hands."

They are trained to not take NO for an answer, but their arrogance and cockiness comes off rude eventually and they're only hired there to get you to sign exclusivity.

Don't waste your time with these guys. There seems to be another one hired every minute and not 1 more honest then the next.