While it’s not always recommended, it’s definitely possible to sell your home on your own—in other words, without a real estate agent. By being organized and following the steps below, you can potentially save 2-3% on real estate agent commissions. At the average home price, this means savings between $3,000 and $4,500!
Now, keep in mind: This will mean spending around $1,000 up front to get everything done right. However, you can consider this simply as an investment to save money once you have sold the house.
Step 1 – Have your home professionally inspected.
Depending on the size of your house, this will cost you between $200 and $400. Almost all buyers will have a home inspected, but I recommend that you, the seller, do it yourself before putting the house on the market.
The reason for this is simple: you need to know more about the house than your buyer when it comes time to negotiate the price.
Normally, the house is hired at a specific price, then the potential buyer has the house inspected. This puts you, the seller, at a disadvantage. The reason is that it’s better for you to know about any potential problems when you’re pricing the house, rather than discovering them once you have a buyer.
Let me put it this way: do you know if your house is connected to the code? Unless you’re an electrician, you probably won’t. Now think about this: which would be better, for you to know your house isn’t wired up to code and price it accordingly, or to find out after a buyer has your house under contract?
In a home negotiation, knowledge is power! It’s worth $300 to get the upper hand in this department.
Also be sure to get a termite inspection if termites are a problem where you live. Termites can destroy your home quickly, and many times you won’t know it until it’s too late. The good news is that most termite companies will inspect your home for free as a way of earning your business. You can even have more than one company perform this inspection.
I recommend that you do these inspections before doing anything else. The home inspection usually takes about 3 hours and the termite inspection one hour. Aside from letting the inspectors in, you don’t even have to be present in the house! Most inspectors can schedule their work to be completed within a week.
