April 26, 2007
How We Sold Our Home Ourselves (FSBO)
By Dana Joseph
A few years ago we sold our house on our own with no real estate agent, you know, with the big “For Sale By Owner” (FSBO) sign out front of the house. In preparation for this, we did a number of things to get our then 10-year-old house sold. Of course, the market was red hot ( a seller’s market) at that time here in Florida which was of tremendous help to us. Here are the steps we took in selling our house ourselves:
1. Cleaned up the inside and outside of the house. This including a small amount of remodeling including new counter tops and floor tile in the kitchen, and new carpeting in the living room. We painted the outside of the home and put in some new landscaping. The house looked really nice when we were finished with the improvements.
2. We researched similar homes in our neighborhood to determine the optimum selling price. We wanted to make sure we priced our home correctly. (If you are not sure how or what to price your home at consider hiring a home appraisal company).
3. Hired a home inspection company for an inspection of our home. Four items were found by the inspection company, and we had these items corrected before we put the house on the market. We saved the receipts from these repairs and attached them to the inspection report as proof that the repairs were made.
4. Hired a real estate attorney. He gave us the basic information regarding a real estate contract and handled our matters from a legal standpoint.
5. Located a title company with the most knowledgeable and courteous title insurance agent. She was willing to take the time to answer our questions and gave us great tips and help along the way.
6. We purchased a number of for sale signs that we placed on the main roads leading into our subdivision. We borrowed one really nice, professional looking “For Sale By Owner” sign for the front yard from a neighbor who had sold their home three months before.
7. We advertised everywhere we could and told everyone we knew that our house was for sale. We showed the home by appointment only and required a letter from their mortgage company stating they had been approved for financing before we showed them the house. We wanted to show the house only to serious buyers. We also required them to fill out a form showing their name, address, and driver’s license number.
8. During the course of a few weeks we received several offers. We accepted the best offer and contacted our attorney who drew up the contract. We notified the title agency who then handled all the other paperwork. The title company set the closing date and all we did was show up, sign all the papers, and receive the check for the proceeds.
If you found this post helpful, you can get free updates by subscribing via RSS or by E-mail.
Topics: Personal Finance, Saving Money |
6 Responses to “How We Sold Our Home Ourselves (FSBO)”
Comments
« 5 Things To Do If You Have A Consumer Complaint | Home | Saving Money On Snack Foods - Make Them Yourself! »
April 26th, 2007 at 10:25 pm
Interesting post, my question: How did buyers feel about collecting their personal information? Just curious on the responses that you got when you asked for this information?
April 28th, 2007 at 7:32 am
If you don’t mind sharing, were the savings over someplace like Help U Sell enough to justify all the work involved? I’m also curious about the question Thomas asked as well.
Thanks.
May 1st, 2007 at 9:25 pm
Thomas: The potential buyers did not mind giving their information. They would have needed to provide it to a real estate agent if they were using one anyway. We were very up front with everyone when they made the appointment to see the house - that we were showing the home to serious buyers only and they would need to provide the above-mentioned information if they wanted to see the house.
Carrie: We saved the 7% real estate commission by handling the sale ourselves. The attorney fees were minimal. I thought the savings were well worth the work. However, we were selling in a very hot seller’s market which made the selling process much easier.
May 2nd, 2007 at 8:23 am
[...] wrote the other day about our experience a few years ago in selling our home ourselves (without a real estate agent). If we were to sell our current home today we would do many of the [...]
June 18th, 2007 at 4:34 am
[...] estate The husband and wife team at Not Made of Money share the story of “how we sold our home ourselves“. If you’ve ever considered doing for-sale by owner (FSBO), this is a great place to [...]
June 18th, 2007 at 10:09 pm
[...] Not Made of Money gives a good personal walk-through of how they sold their home on their own. [...]