Does anyone have any specific advise for selling a home ';for sale by owner';?

One of the first things I would do would be ride through your neighborhood, find homes that closely match yours in size, # of bedrooms, # of bath rooms and other amenities that have real estate signs out. Call and ask the sale price of each.





If you have a friend in the real estate profession that can help, you might see if they can get some comparables for you so you can give a good sale price for your home.





I would also call and see if there is a local mortgage broker that will assist in the selling of the property. Tell them that in exchange for a possible list of people looking at your home what would they be willing to do to help you. If all they want is the list move on to another.





#1 They can assist with open houses





#2 They can assist in getting comparables





#3 They have access to other professionals that are needed to close a real estate transaction, such as escrow, title companies, appraisers and others as deemed necessary.





#4 If they will assist with telephone calls and weed out those that are not pre-approved. Since they will pre-approve those that are not.





Once you have settled on a price, you may now





#1 Place a sign on your property For Sale By Owner (FSBO)





#2 Advertise in your local paper also indicate (no agents please)


There are pros and cons as to advertise your address. You have to decide, but I would, it would eliminate the calls just to get the address.





#3 Make flyers and pass them out as well as place some in a prominent place outside your house for when you are not home.





Make sure you do the following prior to the for sale sign going up.





#1 Make sure you get a professional landscapper to do your lawn, trim all shrubs, do a good edging. Fill all holes then get grass to go over the hole from Lowes or Home Depot.





#2 Do any small repairs you have been putting off, because if you can see them those looking at your house will see them also.





#3 Clean or remove the carpet as well as drapes.





#4 Paint the inside especially the kitchen and all baths. You might also want to do the outside painting if it has not been done in the last five years.





#5 Wash all the windows really clean





#6 Clean the garage get rid of all excess stuff, you are gonna move any way, so throw all the accumulated junk away now. The garage should not be cluttered. Get rid of oil from the floor of the drive-way as well as the floor of the garage. (Paint if necessary)





#7. Get rid of all the stuff that don't go in the yard, what you might think is a good idea others have a different opinion, so get ride of old tires, boxes and clutter.





Once you have found a buyer, you will not need a contract to put to writing what you have agreed to orally. The date is important, put down the sales price, as well as the down payment if any, don't forget to subtract the down payment from the sales price thus you now have the loan amount, the borrower should apply for. Who will cover the closing cost, normally this is split between the buyer and seller.





Put down a date of approximately 25-35 days from the date of your contract. This is the date you hope this transaction will be over. Do not get alarmed it the transaction does not close on that day this is a target date, so don't get your bloomers in a bunch if it doesn't.





Once all parties to the transaction has signed the contract, look in the telephone book and find a title company to handle the closing for you. See if you can find the title company you used to purchase your home or the last time you refinanced it. In some states you will need an attorney as the closing agent. See which is used in your state.





The closing agent will issue escrow or closing instructions based on your contract and what you and the buyer has agreed to. Some things could change as you go along in the transaction, your closer will keep you aware of any and all changes.





When the buyer has secuured a loan their lender will tell the closing officer when funds will be available to close the transaction. After all documentation has been signed and the loan funds you will be given a check after which you will be required to surrender your set of keys to the new buyer.





I hope this has been of some use to you, good luck.





';FIGHT ON';Does anyone have any specific advise for selling a home ';for sale by owner';?
I advise against it, unless you have at least some knowledge and experience about the process. If you don't you can get in all sorts of legal trouble or worse, someone who does know the process can tie your house up and prevent you from selling to anyone else. Like what if he cant qualify for a loan. What would you do then? Or what if the appraisal comes in under the price he offered? How will you market your property? If money is the reason you don't want to use a professional, you should at least contact an escrow company or RE attorney in your state and ask their advise. It's usually free.Does anyone have any specific advise for selling a home ';for sale by owner';?
DON'T!!!





For sale by owner transactions cost the sellers money. The property will take longer to sell so the seller has more ';carrying costs';. The property will sell for LESS than one represented by a good professional Realtor(r). Also, you are opening yourself up to liability because there is no one there advising you of potential problems to help you avoid costly mistakes.





Trust me, selling a house is stressful. By hiring a good agent, you will save yourself both time and money.
If you have decided to sell your home on your own, you’ve joined a growing crowd of For Sale By Owners (FSBO’s) in this area. More and more people are choosing to work without a Real Estate Agent. The main reason: Saving Money.But for the unprepared FSBO home seller, this process can bring them to their wit’s end. Unexpected calls, last-minute walkthroughs, and the thought of being stuck with two homes are all very real concerns. You could lose thousands of dollars in the process if you are not careful. This FREE Report is designed to arm you with the information you need to sell your home fast, and get top dollar. We’ll show you:• How to avoid the 7 Most Common Home Seller Mistakes


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List a few of the amenities, as well as how large the home is,


what the price is, and how the buyer can contact you.• Create a flyer about your home, with a photo of the home, a list


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bottom of this report.Mistake #3 – Improperly Pricing Your Home Price is the most important item to consider when selling your home. If your home is priced too high, your home will languish on the market for months and developed the unflattering distinction of “problem property”. If the price is too low, you will lose thousands of dollars in hard-earned equity needlessly. Remember - It's not what your house is worth, but what someone is willing to pay. You need to gauge market conditions properly for your area, and then set a bit lower than the average. If you price your house according to the market, it's not likely to sell quickly. That's because the top 10% or 20% of houses with the best prices are selling each month in this area. If your house isn't in that lower 20% range, then it isn't likely to sell as quickly... © 2006





u have a busy lifestyle and you shouldn’t waste time dealing with buyers who can’t afford to buy your home, or worse, with buyers who are not really interested, but why are just “seeing what’s available”. Because of this, you need to ensure that everyone you deal with is a qualified prospect.





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By choosing not to work with a Realtor®, you are making some clear trade-offs. The biggest tradeoff is that you have to answer the phone, conduct your own open houses, and showings, instead of the Realtor®. Don’t make the buyer jump through hoops to get information about your home. Always return any calls from buyers as quickly as possible. Make yourself available to answer any questions they might have and work with the buyer’s schedule for showings. When someone shows interest in your home, but never calls you back, don’t automatically assume they are not interested anymore. Call them and follow up. This is not difficult and you should not be intimidated by the fact that it feels like a “cold-call”. Just use this simple script:





“Hi, may I speak with (Buyer Name)?” Then, when the person you want to speak with comes on the line, say “Hi, (Buyer Name), this is (Your Name). I’m calling because you had previously shown great interest in the home I’m selling. My house will probably sell sooner, rather than later, which is why, before it sells, I wanted to follow-up with you and see if you were still interested.”





By using the script above, you will increase your chances of snagging an interested buyer by 3-4 times. Always follow up. And ALWAYS be friendly, courteous and polite when dealing with prospects, even if they don’t seem like they are interested anymore





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Should I sell now or next year?





Not sure if this would help. Usually, a housing market correction last for years. It is unlikely things will brighten up in a few months, afterall, this bubble took 5 years for form.





It might be better to give some discount so you unload the house quickly and can use the gain of the home to make money elsewhere quickly. At the same time, you will save money by not paying mortgage for the next 5 months.





For example, if mortgage is $2500/mo. and you have $300,000 gain sitting in the house, by selling it now rather than 5 months later will save you $12500. It will also earn you as much as $7000 from interests (Assuming CD are paying 5.5% or higher).





Total financial benefit for selling early would be $20,000. I would give buyer some discount just because of that.





Finally, keeping a house in selling condition is a lot of work. If your realtor does staging, it costs extra to rent furnitures. If you are living in the unit, it takes extra effort to keep it clean. So, sell it fast!
You run risk of being robbed. It happens to licensed real estate agents- and we have training and take precautions against it. The trend is away from open houses because it is ineffective and the risk increses that a home will be pilfered or robbed while the agent is distracted by another person.





You run the risk of a non-qualified person contracting to buy your home, tying it up for weeks and loosing another opportunity to sell to a well qualified buyer. If you need to sell, you loose valuable time because of that. You may also give up more than you have to in order to get the deal. Real estate agents pre-qualify their buyers; the best ones get them pre-approved, at least I do.





You run the risk of not getting the message out that your home is for sale, the ammenities of your home, and what makes it a better deal than the other homes competing for the same buyer. It is more than the newspaper ad, a web site (God knows how many of those there are), a sign in the yard and praying that is will sell, for if that were all it took the real estate industry as it is today would not exist. Real estate agents have access to the best tools: the MLS and the real estate network; 80%+ of all real estate sales involve a licensed real estate agent..





You run the risk of failing to obey state, federal or local laws regarding fair housing, disclosure or other ordinances unknown to you. Then you will have to answer to a judge because of your lack of knowledge and your actions taken. What have you saved now?





Save yourself time, money, potential loss of a sale and/or law suit, as about 80% of all FSBO seller end up in the hands of a competitent real estate broker anyway. Go ahead and call a successful broker, bite the bullett, they'll get it done- right. If you had a tooth ache, and it did not go away after you doctored it a few days, you'd go to a professional to get it cared for, correct? This is no different. Plus real estate brokers get more for your home than the typical FSBO sold property in less time on average.





Everything has a cost, there are no free lunches. Be certain you can afford the cost of the direction you choose. Worst things can happen if you forgo a professional, including not selling your home. Ral estate sales are slowing youneed to stack the oddsin your favor. Think about it.
My specific advice is: Don't.





I'm a buyer's specialist. There are several excellent reasons I don't take my client to FSBOs unless they are priced so far below market it isn't funny. 1) Disclosure issues. FSBOs are rotten about them. When you disappear, the client sues me. Not going to happen. 2) My client is out of pocket my fee, whereas in normal practice you'd end up paying it out of the listing commission. So I'd better be prepared to justify the transaction in court as being less expensive to my client. Not likely, because 3) FSBOs are almost always drastically overpriced, and usually in denial. If my client wants it, first I have to persuade them where the market is, then I have to persuade them to offer a realistic bargain to my client, and the vast majority of FSBOs won't pull their heads out of where they are stuck. 4) I have to do the work of both agents for one commission, and often the seller will try to claim that I violated fiduciary duty as their agent. I'm not their agent, as I always make clear, I'm representing the buyer only. I owe them the best possible bargain (That's rarely a FSBO), and my best efforts. I could go on and one, but you should get the idea. FSBO is a bad trip for everybody.





Discount listers, on the other hand, I love to sit across the table from. Good buyer's agents eat discounters alive.
Don't do it!


You'll end up spending more time and money in the long run, and could end up with some legal problems if you don't understand your state laws. The new buyer might expect things you didn't plan on parting with, but because it's not stated in the contract right you could end up with a law suit.


Also the market for homes is really cooling and so it will be harder to sell your home yourself. if you have a realitor they will have more resources then a average person to market the house, and process the sale expidently.


:) You have enough to deal with when you move, why not let someone else handle all the marketing, selling, and legalities of it.