By James Hoffman
LEARNING HOW TO GET THE BEST PRICE FOR YOUR HOME
Selling your home can be surprisingly time consuming and emotionally challenging. It can feel like an invasion of privacy when strangers open your closets and poke around. They will openly criticize your home and your decorating abilities and to top it all off, they will offer you less money than you think your home is worth.
With no experience and a complex transaction on your hands it’s easy for home sellers to make mistakes. The best way to sell a house comes down to a few basics:
1. Keep your emotions in check and stay focused on the business aspect. Remember, it’s about a business transaction, nothing more or less and that is why you need to hire a great agent / broker. who has been in the business for a number of years and knows the neighborhood such as Greenwich.
2. Set a reasonable price and keep the time of year in mind and avoid the winter months if possible.
3. Try to remember how you felt when you were shopping for your home. If you can remember that you are selling a piece of property as well as an image and a lifestyle, you’ll be more likely to put in the extra effort of staging as well as doing some minor remodeling to get top dollar for your property. These changes in appearance will not only help the sales price; they’ll also help you create emotional distance because your home will look less familiar.
4. Let’s talk about hiring a great agent /broker. A great real estate agent has your best interests at heart. They will help you set a fair and competitive selling price, increasing your odds of a quick sale. An agent /broker can also help tone down the emotion of the process by interacting with potential buyers and eliminating tire kickers who only want to look at your property but have no intention of making an offer. Your real estate agent /broker will have much more experience negotiating home, helping you get more money than you could on your own. If any problems crop up during the process, the experienced professional will be there to handle them for you. Finally, your agent/broker are familiar with all the paperwork and pitfalls involved in real estate transactions and can help make sure the process goes smoothly. This means there won’t be any delays or unforseen legal ramifications in the process.
SELLING DURING THE WINTER MONTHS
Believe it or not, there is a right time to sell during the year. Winter, especially around the holidays, is typically a slow time of the year for home sales. Because fewer buyers are likely to be looking, it may take longer to sell your home and you may not get as much money. However, you can take some consolation in knowing that while there may not be as many active buyers, there also won’t be as many competing sellers, which can sometimes work to your advantage.
TWO ADDITIONAL ITEMS NOT CARRYING PROPER INSURANCE
Your lender may have required you to acquire a homeowner’s insurance policy. If not you’ll want to make sure you are insured in case a viewer has an accident on the premises and tries to sue you for damages. You also want to make sure there are no obvious hazards at the property or that you take steps to mitigate them (keeping the children of potential buyers away from your pool and getting your dog out of the house during showings.
HIDING MAJOR PROBLEMS
Think you can get away with hiding major problems with your property? Any problems will be uncovered during the buyer’s inspection. You have three options. Either fix the problem ahead of time or eliminate a fair number of buyers who want a turnkey home. Having your home inspected before listing is always a good idea if you want to avoid costly surprises after the home is under contract.
