Most people think that the only way to sell a house is to call a real estate agent. Wrong! You can sell your house in two alternative ways: 1. Sell directly to a Home Buyer company, like us, or 2. You can do For Sale By Owner, where you take on the task to sell it yourself to an end-buyer or a Direct Home Buyer (investor), but you don’t have to pay agent commissions! Let’s look at some details on the sales process…
Costs You May Incur Before Listing
When you are preparing to sell a house, if you have the time and money, the best way would be to do research on the local listing (MLS) and see what other similar homes in your neighborhood sell for. That will give you an idea of the homes that sell and what their price and condition is. Many people will be surprised that many of the homes for sale are rehabbed homes, probably not in the same condition as yours. We get it, you think your home is worth what Zillow/Redfin says, but often that is not the case, unless your home was fully rehabbed in the last 2 months! So what are the pre-sale costs – that is the construction, cleaning, staging, repairs, landscaping, etc. basically the costs to do a light or major rehab of your home to get it to the highest market value. But we know you may not always have the funds, contractors or time to deal with that and you may consider selling “as is” to an investor.
Agent Costs
Did you think agents are free? Not really. Most people work for money, so the agent swill usually take 6%, which is usually split between your agent and the other one representing the person buying your house. Here is the place to explain that no two agents are alike – some will take a couple of pictures and then post your house online, do ca couple of showings and make $6000 of the sale of your house. Others will work much harder, will help you with ideas for cleaning, staging, showings, will diligently and enthusiastically represent the house during showings, will market the house constantly and will tent to potential buyers day and night to get you the best price. So, just like in any other industry, some people will please you , and some may disappoint.
At The Closing Table
In some cases you, as the seller will have to also come up with extra processing/closing costs. You can usually estimate this to be 2% of the final sale price. These costs include: appraisal fees, taxes, title search, dee recording, deed recording, credit checks, etc. Contrast that with a direct sale to Coastal Edge Homebuyers, and guess what, you pay none of these costs, on top of not having to pay any agent commissions at all!
Timing for the Closing is Important
Another important factor for you to consider is timing. In some cases you need to sell super fast, or, you may need to time the closing to coincide exactly with a certain date for you want to close on so you can time your move to a new house. When you deal with traditional sale through an agent, you usually have not idea when the closing will be, but if you sell to Coastal Edge Homebuyers directly, we can actually make the closing date whenever you want! This is the power of the fast cash offer that we can make!