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SELLING A HOME
Kara's Commitment to Her Sellers
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Why Use a Realtor to Sell your
Home
Avoidable Turnoffs for Potential
Buyers |
FAQ's for Sellers
Why Use a Realtor
to Sell a Home?
Most homeowners use a real estate agent
to sell their homes for many good reasons. The following list
describes the most common reasons. A growing minority of homeowners
choose not to use a real estate agent but a number of services who
provide just one or two of the services of an agent. Homeowners who
sell their homes without agents do it to save money as well as to
feel more control over the sales process.
Setting the Sale Price
An experienced successful real estate agent will be able to help you
select a sales price that will help you sell your house faster and
potentially for more money. Qualified agents have the experience of
selling homes in your area and understand what pricing strategies
work best. Some areas require a medium sale price, which attracts
buyers, but offers little room for negotiation. In other areas, the
pricing strategy may be to offer a low price and allow potential
buyers to bid it up. A good real estate agent's experience in this
area could be very valuable.
Staging
To sell your house fast and for the most money, the appearance of
your home is very important. The list above will get you started,
but having an experienced critical eye look through your house and
make suggestions for repairs, furniture layout, and decorating can
add thousands of dollars to your sale price. The value of a critical
eye cannot be underestimated. After living in your home for several
years, surrounded by your cherished possessions its hard to be
objective about which ones are too much or may take away from the
appearance of your house for a typical buyer.
Marketing
A real estate agent has ready access and experience in the use of
several very valuable marketing tools including the Multiple Listing
Service (MLS), print advertisements in newspapers and magazines,
Internet listings, and network of other real estate agents. You have
access to most of these marketing tools without a real estate agent,
but a real estate agent has expertise on how and when to use these
marketing tools as well as get exposure for your home faster.
Negotiating
When you sell your home yourself, you need to be able to act not
like a proud homeowner, but an impartial negotiator to maximize your
sale price and profit. An experienced real estate agent can be a
buffer between you and the turmoil of dealing with the buyer
directly. Plus, a successful real estate agent can offer negotiating
skills that most homeowners do not have. These skills could result
in a higher price for your home.
Closing
Once you accepted an offer, the work continues. There will be
inspections to manage, financing to arrange and paperwork to
complete. Often, the inspections result in questions and new
requests from the buyers. A good negotiator can manage the requests
prompted by inspection findings to minimize the cost to the seller
and ensure that the sale of your home closes.
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