The simple answer is no. You can be your own boss and sell your home without a Realtor.
As with most ventures, there are pros and cons to hiring a real estate agent such saving money to setting the right price.
However, if you’re in the market to sell, you may already feel like a real estate agent from researching home sales (comps), surveying interest rates and investigating close costs. It can feel like you opened up a detective agency instead of trying to sell your home.
But if you like cop dramas or investigative podcasts, then this could be up your alley.
Still, there are some challenges but let us help you with making that decision.
Do comparisons
When selling to the San Diego Home Buyer on your own, you’ll make more money on the sale. A Realtor typically takes a 6% commission (then splits with the buyer’s agent), which can be a significant amount of cash. Like, new car, fancy vacation or epic weekend in Vegas cash.
Since you don’t have a real estate agent, you can cut out the time researching which one to go with. The really good ones are on point and take care of the little things, as well as the big things.
The bad ones, well, leave you feeling like you’re doing most of the work when that’s why you hired them. Trust us, we know the good ones from the bad ones.
The internet allows you to find the comparisons (comps) easier, which helps with you determining a listing price. Also, you can easily calculate any upgrades or repairs, which is part of developing the price.
Finding the right price is critical as the wrong price will turn off buyers, thus it will sit longer on the market making it much more difficult to sell. Since real estate is on fire in San Diego, lowballing your own home will not leave cash on the table.
Performing a competitive market analysis (CMA, looking at comps) by looking at what previous homes in your area have sold for. You can find those prices through various websites and/or your county assessor’s office; although those can be a nightmare to navigate because governments love a challenge, apparently.
Prep your home
Curb appeal is industry jargon for making the front of your home look nice. Especially when you want to sell.
You’ll also want to clean and perform any repairs necessary (keep reading and we’ll get to how we take that off your plate). Some homes are staged and others are not.
When I bought my first home, the seller didn’t stage. It gave me a holistic look at the home and got the juices flowing as to how and where I would decorate and arrange furniture. But staged homes are fine, too.
Marketing
A real estate agent will use MLS (Multiple Listing Service) which brokers and other agents have access to. They will also use their social media, broker’s website and others, such as Zillow or Redfin, as well as open houses to push their listings.
You can do the same, minus the MLS. And in San Diego, it won’t be long before you have a dozen calls about the listing.
Just be ready to show the home super-fast because the market is white hot. Heck, you may even get a sight-unseen offer over asking price. Sounds crazy, but that’s the market we live in today.
Then be ready to negotiate. This may be difficult for some, but it’s just as important as anything.
Paperwork
There will be mountains of paperwork, but there are resources such as FSBO.com (For Sale By Owner) to help with that. You’ll also want to check with your county assessor’s office and the state to make sure everything is above board, legally speaking.
You’ll want to make sure you have the original sales contract from the previous owner, property survey, certificate of compliance, mortgage documents, tax records, inspection/appraisal results and reports, maintenance records, warranty information, any HOA documents, CMA, preliminary title report, disclosures, purchase offer, final purchase agreement, most recent tax statement, closing statement, 1099-S tax form and the deed.
You may also need to hire a real estate attorney to review the paperwork.
Did we say there will be mountains of paperwork? I remember my closing and it was a tsunami of paper I didn’t know could exist for one transaction.
Still, with the right prep work, selling on your own is more than doable. In fact, about 10% of all sales in the U.S. are FSBO.
Closing costs
The typical closing costs are about 10% of the final sales price. Without a Realtor, though, you’ll save a ton of cash, but will still pay some of the costs including the buyer’s commission of 3% if they have a Realtor. Nothing’s free, unfortunately.
But when you work with The San Diego Home Buyer, you will never pay any closing costs. You won’t pay for a title search, title insurance, escrow fee, transfer tax, marketing, attorney’s fees and any other miscellaneous fees owed. We will take care of all the closing costs for you.
The bottom line: you’ll net as much selling to an all-cash buyer like The San Diego Home Buyer as you would if you listed and sold your home on the open-market because you do not pay any commissions, fees, or closing costs that are part of a typical transaction.
The difference
With the San Diego Home Buyer, we’re not afraid to buy properties as is. So, you can calculate your home’s value and we’ll make a fair, market-rate offer.
Say good-bye to costs associated with curb appeal, inspections, repairs, staging’s and, the big one, commissions. That 50% just became a whole lot more money in your pocket. Remember Vegas?
Depending on the situation, you may not even pay closing costs with us. Yeah, you read that right.
Also, we pay cash so for those who don’t use a Realtor, we just removed an ocean’s worth of stress and anxiety because our deals don’t need to be financed. All kinds of issues can kill a deal with financing, but with us, it’s nothing but smooth sailing.
We have an in-house construction team. When you sell to us, we’ll take care of those repairs.
We don’t take a commission. That’s not our business model, so that’s a big chunk of money back to you. Epic vacation anyone?
We buy fast. Since we’re all cash, taking care of inspections and repairs, we can close on your timeline. We mean days, not weeks or months so you can get into that new property and kick your feet up.
