Discount Brokerages? Oh, Puleeze...

I sent the following letter to the L.A. Times editor:
Re Sunday's L.A. Times Real Estate section article about discount brokerages, I think it would have been only fair for the Times to have disclosed that its parent company, Tribune Corp, owns Help-U-Sell. Also, an excellent reason to use a full-service broker instead of a discounter appears right in the Times Homes advertising section: unlike the full service brokerages, discounters won't purchase print advertising for their listings because it costs them too much. Nor do the discount brokerages do much on-line advertising as the full service brokers do. For home sellers, now more than ever, media exposure is the path to sales and that means much more advertising than just a sign in the yard and a box of flyers. The question should be not why a seller would want to pay for full services, but why a seller would throw away money on a discounter instead of paying a percentage point or two more and getting the services they truly need.