Many people anticipate the costs of buying a house, but not as many know what it costs when you sell your house. Selling a house comes with its own share of expenses that can catch you off-guard if you're not prepared, which is why it's always a good idea to plan a budget before you decide to sell your house.
Not all of the expenses involved with selling your home are unavoidable. In fact, some expenses, like hiring a real estate agent, can either be reduced significantly, or entirely avoided altogether. There are a couple of ways to save yourself a lot of money on a real estate agent if you decide to sell your house.
This guide will provide you with some helpful information on how to save yourself as much money as possible when you sell your home and how to get the most bang for your buck when dealing with a real estate agent during the selling process.
Sell the house yourself
The most common way to avoid the expenses incurred by having a real estate agent is to simply sell your home yourself. While this practice is not recommended by most real estate experts, it is the best way to save yourself money when it comes time to sell your home. When you sell your home by yourself, you're cutting out the middle man, which means that you're also cutting out the commission that you'll have to pay the agent when the home is sold, potentially saving you thousands of dollars in the process.
The best way to sell your home yourself is to list it wherever you can. Real estate companies have the upper hand when it comes to this because they can easily print their listings in brochures that get passed around to local businesses, on their website, and on all of the major real estate websites. The good news is that you can too, for the most part. Many of the popular real estate websites on the internet like Zillow and Trulia allow homeowners who are selling their home by themselves to create a listing on the site.
Since there is no better place to be visible these days then on the internet, creating listings on these real estate websites is your best option at attracting prospective homebuyers searching for available homes in your area. Since these websites attract a large amount of traffic, how you list your home is just as important as where you list it. It's absolutely essential for you to create an attractive listing that will not only draw interest towards your home but will make prospective buyers want to come out and take a look in person.
When it comes time to actually close a sale, you should also make sure that you hire a real estate lawyer to take care of all of the paperwork and legal proceedings that are involved with the sale of a home. An experienced real estate lawyer can help you navigate the tricky world of real estate law and you can really benefit from the knowledge and experience they will bring to the negotiation process, the closing process and the signing of the title for the home over to the new owners.
Negotiate the agent's commission
Another way to save money on real estate agents is negotiating the commission. Not all real estate companies and their agents have commissions that are set in stone, and many can be negotiated to a lower percentage if the agent is open to compromise and willing to negotiate with you. Some real estate agents are so eager to make a sale that they will happily negotiate their commission, as long the negotiations are reasonable and fair. Of course, other agents may just flat-out decline to negotiate, simply because they don't want to take a smaller cut or because their company won't allow them to.
There are a few things you can do to make your negotiation a bit smoother. You can offer to share some of the work involved in selling the home and take on more responsibilities for a discount. For example, you can arrange and hold your own open house events, print your own brochures and flyers for the home and prepare your home for public viewings and open houses. Also, if you are going to be selling your home to a friend or family member, it should be easy to receive a discount from your real estate agent since most of the work in finding a buyer and negotiating on a closing price will most likely already be handled by you.
If you sell your home in the real estate offseason, which is either in the dead of winter or the late dog-days of summer in most places, you'll be more likely to receive a discount on your real estate agent's commission simply because of the slow business that typically occurs during these times of the year.
Things to look out for
Of course, trying to sell your home by yourself or negotiate a lower commission with your real estate agent isn't always as easy as it sounds. There are some potential pitfalls to doing both of these things. Here are just a few examples:
- Selling your home isn't easy. If you want to cut out the real estate agent altogether and sell your home by yourself, remember this: there's a reason why real estate agents are licensed by the state and are professionals at selling homes, and it's because they're good at what they do. Selling a home by yourself is not an easy task for the average person and there is a lot of work involved. Many times, homeowners will attempt to avoid the commission rates and sell their homes on their own, only to find that they didn't end up saving any money in the long run, and actually may have cost themselves more money.
- Be wary about selling your home during the offseason. While selling your home during the offseason may save you some money on your real estate agent commission, it may also be a lot more difficult for you to find buyers for your home during these times of the year. Not too many people look to buy new homes during the dead of the winter, so you may not be making your life any easier in the long run.