Selling Your Home By Yourself
Selling a home is a lot of work. While we recommend using a REALTOR® to sell your home, we want to offer these tips for people who choose to sell their own home.
1. Proper Pricing
This is the most crucial factor in selling a house. A property generates the most excitement and interest among brokers and buyers when it first goes on the market. These first few weeks are when the number of showings is the greatest if it is priced correctly at fair market value. When a home is priced too high, your house will miss all this momentum. Even if you drop the price later on, you’ll fail to generate the excitement potential you had in the first few weeks. As a result, you may even have to drop your price below market value just to compete with the newer competitively priced listings.
Over priced homes take much longer to sell. And homes that have been on the market too long get a reputation as a “problem property”. Don’t expect your buyers to be uninformed about the local market conditions: with all the technology available today…even with the limited information available on this site alone…your prospective buyers will likely know an overpriced home when they see one.
If you would like a free, no-obligation Comparative Market Analysis to see what we feel is the true market value of your home, please request a report.
2. Marketing
Once you’ve decided to sell your home, come up with a plan to get the word out. No one can make an offer if no one knows it’s for sale! Use advertising methods available to you, including classifieds, and putting a sign up in your yard with informational fliers.
Marketing your home doesn’t just refer to advertising, however. You’ve got to market your home to potential buyers once they decide they’re interested. Prepare your home for sale by researching the most effective ways to enhance the value of your home. Learn a bit about house showing basics, make your home available for showing as much as possible, and keep your house clean and ready for showing at any time.
3. Dealing with Buyers
Anyone purchasing a home wants to offer as little as possible…including you when you bought the house you’re planning to now sell! That’s why it’s important to know exactly what the home is worth and how low of an offer is really reasonable. Rejecting anything lower than the asking price, and your house could be on the market for a long time…but accept the first offer that comes your way and that can also cost you. Determining exactly where this fine line is can be tricky.
Also be prepared to answer lots of questions, including ones usually asked of REALTORS®, like “How does your home compare to others like it in the area?”, “What about financing? Can you help?”, and “If I make an offer, who will draw up the paperwork?”. Be prepared to answer these questions, as well as the ones they will have about the property; think ahead about what to say and when to say it.
4. Financing
For an inexperienced homeseller, this can be the most looming aspects of selling your own home. Know ahead of time what you want and consult with people who’ve had experience in this area, including a local mortgage lender. Do your research and make sure you fully understand the process and the risks of accepting offers from unqualified buyers. Taking a look at our Financing section will get you started.
5. REALTORS®
Once you put your house up for sale, many of the first calls you get inevitably will be from REALTORS® who want you to sell your house through them. Should you choose to use a REALTOR®, make sure you pick the right one: a lousy REALTOR® can be worse than no REALTOR® at all. Out-of-town brokers and agents won’t be familiar enough with the area to effectively market your home, discount brokers tend to offer less-than average service with their less-than-average fee, and choosing friends and family who offer to do the work for you can result in soured relationships should things not go as well as expected. Do your research and don’t just choose the first REALTOR® that comes along. Find out why Judy is the best choice for the job, right here on our site!
