It's called conditioning and starts the moment you sign up with the agent. Up until that point, the agent is talking the price up. After you sign they will immediately start talking it down. Thats how the system works. Get the listing, reduce the price and sell the property. The agent makes their money only if the house sells and the difference in commision between getting you a high price and getting you to reduce the price to the point where it sells is marginal.

On the other hand, the agent might be acting in your best interest to talk some sense into you to reduce the price so the house sells and you can move on with your life.

The problem for agents is a market where nothing is moving. That is the strange period we are in at the moment where we have an inverse peak in the number of properties changing hands. With an ongoing credit crunch, I expect that we will see an extended period where prices become almost irrelevant becasue buyers won't be able to access credit to purchase anything! This presents real estate agents with a real dilemma (and a great ooportunity) in creatively working through transactions where the sellers will need to finaice the buyers in the absence of third party lenders.