What a Florida licensee can do for a Georgetown move

What works differently in Texas

• Real estate licensing is state by state. An agent licensed in Florida cannot represent you in Texas, and a Texas licensee cannot represent you in Florida.
• Texas is a non-disclosure state: sale prices are not public record. Researching value works differently there than in Florida, where documentary stamps on the deed make the price effectively public. Your Texas agent will explain what that changes.
• Texas joins Florida in having no broad-based tax on wage income, so that particular line in the relocation spreadsheet does not move. Most of the other lines will.
• Texas is a community property state. How a married couple may take title, and what happens to cost basis on the first death, follow different rules than in Florida. Raise it with your attorney before closing, not after.
• Closings in Texas are generally handled through a title or escrow company rather than by an attorney as a matter of course, which is closer to the Florida pattern than not.
• Like Florida, Texas has coastal exposure and a named-storm deductible regime in its property insurance market. The mechanism will feel familiar; the numbers will not necessarily.
• Florida’s homestead exemption and its Save Our Homes assessment cap do not follow you. Texas has its own property tax treatment, its own exemptions, and its own rules on how fast an assessment may rise. Confirm the specifics with the local taxing authority.

Why you are reading this

If you are selling in Georgetown rather than buying, this introduction matters more, not less. A listing agreement is a contract for a fixed term with a named brokerage, and it is considerably harder to unwind than a conversation with a buyer’s agent. So take longer over it than you think you need to. Ask what the agent will actually do in the first fortnight, ask in writing what it costs you to end the arrangement early, and do not sign anything on the first call — including anything I put in front of you, which is nothing at all.

What actually happens next

Where I stop, on purpose

I will not treat the introduction as the end of my involvement when that suits me and the beginning of it when that suits me better. What I owe you afterwards is honesty and a returned telephone call. What I cannot offer is supervision of another brokerage’s agent, because I have no authority over them at all. I would rather draw that line now than have you rely on something I am unable to deliver.

Questions worth asking on that first call

• How do you prefer to communicate, how quickly do you normally reply, and who covers your clients when you are away? Settle that in the first week and most of the friction in a long-distance transaction disappears.
• Do you work alone or as part of a team? If it is a team, ask who writes the offer, who attends the inspection, and who I will actually be speaking to at nine o’clock on a Tuesday morning.
• How are deposits handled in Texas — who holds the money, what amount is customary, and at what point does it stop being refundable? Get that answer before you write the cheque rather than after.
• What goes into an offer here besides the price, and what do sellers in Texas expect to see attached to it? Local custom on this varies more than people moving between states tend to assume.

Where I stop being a referral and start being your agent

There is a version of this where I am not a referral at all. If the property you are leaving is in Florida, I can list and sell it as your agent under The Keyes Company — that half is squarely my licence — while the Georgetown side goes to the licensee I introduce you to. Say so early, because the two timelines have to be planned against each other.

Other cities in Texas

• El Paso
• Arlington
• Corpus Christi
• Plano
• Lubbock
• Irving
• Garland
• Frisco
• All of Texas