Sign the Buyer's Agent's "Exclusive Right To Buy Listing Contract"?

[Kimberly T.]

My husband and I are not currently working with any agents. We have been looking at multi family properties in an area we are looking to invest in, and recently contacted an agent about some mls listings. He has contacted listing agents with our questions, and we just asked him to put together an offer for us. He emailed the offer purchase contract to me along with the Exclusive Right To Buy Listing Contract. I have never received one of these before (we have bought other multi family properties in other areas before and never got this before).

This contract appears to state that we would be required to use this agent as our buyers agent for the next four months. I have heard of these types of contracts before, but am unsure of why a buyer would ever agree to sign one. Is this just normal in some states? If we don't sign it, would they agent be unlikely to want to submit offers for us? What are the pros and cons of signing this?