very weekend Ted and Alice meet with a broker to comb the countryside for the house of their dreams. As they search, the couple confides their every wish for the future, their financial status and their child's school needs. Yet despite this intimacy, the broker is not working for them. She really works for the sellers, as do more than 95 percent of the nation's real estate brokers.

That means the agent's real obligation is to the homeowner seeking to sell. If you tell that agent how much you love a certain home and you're willing to pay up to a certain amount, the agent is legally required to reveal that figure to the seller.

Many sophisticated buyers and even brokers themselves have trouble sorting out the legal and personal relationships. This is particularly true when a sub-agent, rather than the listing broker, makes the sale. Sub-agents contact the broker when they see the house placed on the multiple listing system and think they have a potential buyer. The sub-agent usually has never met the seller. Still, she's obligated to them, not to that nice buyer she now knows so well.

Enter the "buyer's broker."

More and more brokers are acting on behalf of buyers. You can find listings of more than 3,200 such agents on the Internet. In addition, all of the largest realtors will act as seller's brokers, buyer's brokers and even "disclosed dual agents," which have both the seller and buyer as clients.

Aside from a shift in legal obligation from seller to buyer, a buyer's broker is more likely to show foreclosed and bank-owned properties, as well as FSBOs (for sale by owner, pronounced "fisbo").

Buyer's brokers are usually non-exclusive. A buyer can have many brokers and has no obligation to any of them, regardless of how many houses were shown or how many hours of time were expended.

If a buyer's broker requires exclusivity, she will get a commission no matter how you find the property. So you should avoid exclusivity deals. But if you think this agent is the perfect one for you, make sure you get the following services from that agent, at a minimum:

Exclusive brokers should also negotiate the personal property that stays with the premises and be responsible if you close on an unsound structure or pay well above the market price for a property.

Interestingly, at closing the commission check may come from the seller or the buyer, depending on convenience. The buyer may simply write two checks, one for the seller and one for the commission. Sometimes all the money goes to the seller, who brings a certified check to compensate the buyer's broker. Sometimes the buyer's mortgage bank prepares a check from the loan proceeds to the seller.

Even with this revised payment system, the problem remains that a buyer's broker gets paid more if the buyer pays more. There is an inherent conflict in deriving payment based on a percentage of price. In other words, your agent gets paid more if he or she gets you to pay more than is necessary.

It would be more consistent to base the percentage on the amount under market you paid as a result of the broker's efforts. But that's not the way it is most of the time.

As buyer's brokers proliferate, so do payment alternatives. Currently, a few do work on a lowered percentage basis or even an hourly rate. Be aware that the buyer's broker may charge you a fee that will be forfeited if you don't buy within a period of time. If you decide to use a buyer's broker, make sure the legal relationship and compensation is very clear.

Terms should cover:

So, should you use a buyer's broker or the traditional seller's broker?

Currently, it probably works best to do both. Seller's brokers have to disclose many defects to the buyer by law. They include all environmental, legal and many serious structural problems of the property. They need not disclose the financial condition of the seller. However, a savvy seller may not confide all of these issues to a buyer's broker.

If you have already selected the property you want, many buyer's brokers offer appraisal and negotiation services at a reasonable rate. If the property is unique, or perhaps not yet on the market, a buyer's broker is best positioned to make the deal happen.