In Utah, I can represent you, or I can represent the person on the other side. There is a third possibility, and it is the one worth reading about before it comes up. When both sides of a deal sit inside my brokerage, I can act as a limited agent for both of you at once.
What limited agency costs you
There is a standard consent form for this. It says the cost plainly. A limited agent "cannot provide to both parties undivided loyalty, full confidentiality and full disclosure of all information known to the agent." The same form says a limited agent "must remain neutral in the representation of a seller and buyer" and "may not disclose to either party information likely to weaken the bargaining position of the other." It also states that most in-house sales involve limited agency, because the seller and the buyer are represented by the same brokerage.
Source: Utah Association of REALTORS, Limited Agency Consent Agreement (UAR Form 7), revised March 19, 2010. You can read the blank form here: Limited Agency Consent Agreement, Utah Association of REALTORS. The association's forms library asks for a member login, so if it stops you, ask me and I will email you the blank form. Read it before we meet rather than at a table with a pen in your hand.
My position
If a buyer I represent wants a home I have listed, I will offer to hand one side to another agent at Equity Real Estate (Advantage) rather than go neutral on both of you. If you would rather I act as a limited agent, that is your call, it goes in writing, and I will tell you first what neutrality costs you at the negotiating stage.
I raise this in the first conversation. Not at the signing.
What I am paid does not change which side I am on
How I am paid is on its own page, in full: How I get paid.