If you want to sell your home, you’ve probably encountered the common question that many home sellers are facing today: Should I have a real estate agent help me or I should I sell my house myself?
It’s a trade-off. While real estate agents do provide a great service of listing your home, marketing it, and helping you navigate the complex sale process, it means paying them a percentage of the sale price of your property. That’s fine to do for the service they provide but sometimes you need that money… so you need to sell your home yourself.
How to sell your own home in Memphis TN
If you decide not to work with an agent then that means you’ll be offering your house “For Sale By Owner” (FSBO).
To do this effectively, start by taking the initial steps of preparing your house for sale. This includes cleaning and having the house evaluated and inspected before listing it. At this stage, make sure you gather as much information as you can about your house and about comparable houses in the area so you can get an accurate understanding of how much your house is worth. (Hint: too many FSBO homeowners dramatically OVERvalue their homes and then wonder why no one is interested in buying).
Market your house relentlessly in any channel you can — from newspapers to online to social media. Encourage friends and family to share your property on their social media pages to maximize your exposure. Be relentless! Get the message out about your house as often as you can and as widely as you can. Blanket all of Memphis with your marketing!
When you get an interested buyer, negotiate the sale price with them. Remember that all negotiations have some give-and-take, which means that they may want a lower price but you can ask for things as well.This is often the most difficult part because you don’t want to give away too much but you also don’t want to stick too hard to your original number and drive away your buyer. Negotiating is a “dance” so tread carefully to come to terms with your prospective buyer.
Reach an agreement with the seller then close the deal to sell your own home in Memphis TN by filling out the necessary paperwork.
It’s a complex process but fortunately you don’t necessarily have to do it all alone; there are websites which provide particular services to FSBO. Such services include advertisements, real estate lawyers, seminars, among others.
The most important thing to remember: Don’t get discouraged! It’s a complicated process and it can take time (that’s why real estate agents get paid to do it for a job). Stick with it and keep marketing your property.
If you find that the process simply takes too long for your liking, or is too complex, you do have other options. For example, you can contact us at (901) 443-4660 to buy your house from you. (We buy houses for cash).
To learn more about your home buying process, give us a call at (901) 443-4660 or click here to fill out the form and we’ll get back to you.