THERE are few things that New Yorkers react to more quickly than the trilling of a smartphone as it signals the arrival of an e-mail message.
With lightning speed they respond to e-mail messages on the street, in cabs, on buses, standing in line at Starbucks, the instant their Q train emerges from darkness onto the Manhattan Bridge.
So perhaps it should come as no surprise that many real estate deals involving multimillion-dollar apartments and complicated co-op board applications are also now being done electronically.
In the current market, with fewer apartments being sold and buyers waiting to scrape the bottom of the market, many brokers say that the immediacy of e-communication often helps them keep deals alive.
However, the art of negotiation takes on a whole new meaning online and raises a host of new questions.
Can a negotiation be conducted entirely via e-mail? How much and what kind of information can be shared online? Are there times when agents and clients should put their BlackBerrys away and pick up the telephone? Are exclamation points and smiley faces unprofessional?
“It’s a different type of written negotiation that people in the industry have never been trained for,” said Diane Levine, the downtown brokerage manager for Sotheby’s International and a lawyer by training. She says she is always cautious before putting anything in writing, even in an e-mail message.
“It’s the way of the world now, so we’ve got to get used to it,” she said. “But I think agents should be careful to have a plan in mind and not just let it be about spitting everything out in the next e-mail.”
There are obvious benefits and pitfalls to bargaining by e-mail.
It is a good way to send information, to keep a record of communication and to keep everyone informed at the same time, said G. Richard Shell, a professor of legal studies and business ethics at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
“But it can tend to go wrong if there’s any kind of conflict or misunderstanding,” he said, “because it can’t convey any nuance or emotion.” To resolve a conflict or unravel a misunderstanding, Mr. Shell said, “you really have to pick up the phone or walk down the street and talk face to face.”
Some studies of e-mail raise warning flags that might be interesting to people who do online negotiating.
“People are less inhibited and they seem to feel that they can get away with more self-serving behavior when they send an e-mail,” said Terri R. Kurtzberg, an associate professor of management and global business at Rutgers Business School. In a study that she conducted with researchers at DePaul and Lehigh Universities, she found that people are more likely to lie in an e-mail message than when they converse on paper. People don’t ask questions as well online and are less likely to reveal their true interests, she said.
But others think that there are circumstances when online bargaining makes sense. Kathleen L. McGinn, a professor of business administration at the Harvard Business School who has written extensively about negotiation, says real estate is one area in which e-mail negotiation may actually be better than face-to-face negotiation.
E-mail can help buyers and sellers be more forthcoming about what they really want, Dr. McGinn said. “It might be uncomfortable for me to sit across from someone and say, ‘Could you leave the sofa?’ ” she said. “But if you put it online, you’re just getting it on a list and you don’t have to worry about seeming penny-pinching or petty.”
The record that e-mail creates can also make brokers more accountable.
article above provided by NY Times
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