What Is The Process For Selling a Home?

Although most homeowners think that they’ll easily and quickly sell their homes, this isn’t entirely true. After all, there are so many steps in the process and there are also factors that you can and cannot control, which means that you’ll have to carefully plan out and understand the entire process.

For example, there are things that you cannot control such as the market climate your property is located in, but on the other hand, you could choose to hire an experienced real estate agent and purchase a home listing package that’ll help you make the entire process easier, quicker, and more cost-efficient.

If you’re planning on selling your property in the near future, but have no idea what you should do and where to begin, you’re lucky, mostly because our guide from below will shed some light on the things you’ll have to do. In this article, we’ll discuss the following topics:

1. Find a Suitable Realtor
2. Review Marketing Strategies
3. Improve Your Home + Property
4. Prepare For an Open House
5. Review an offer
6. The Home Appraisal
7. Prepare For Inspections
8. The Closing

1. Find a Suitable Realtor

As we mentioned, it isn’t easy to sell a property, which is one of the main reasons why you should opt for finding and hiring a suitable realtor. You could, for example, ask your family, friends, or colleagues for an experienced realtor, or you could review different websites, compare different offers, and then make your decision. Keep in mind, reading the reviews is extremely important, hence, don’t neglect to do so. It is also best to select a realtor who does this full time rather than a friend who does one or two transactions per year on the side to ensure you are getting someone who is an expert and dedicated.

2. Review Marketing Strategies

Another important thing that you should focus on is discussing a marketing strategy. In most cases, your realtor comes up with some marketing strategy scenarios based on your home selling goals. Then, you can review and select which one makes the most sense for you.  Of course, if you have some recommendations, you can always ask them to make some adjustments. Selling your home is a team effort.

3. Improving Your Home + Property

Is your fence broken in several places? Do the walls in your home need a fresh coat of paint? Is your driveway dirty? Though you might not care about these things, potential buyers will and they could use it for lowering the price of your home. Because of this, it’s extremely important that you improve your home and property. Of course, you don’t have to spend thousands on renovating it, a simple coat of paint, some de-cluttering and some minor repairs can do wonders.

4. Prepare For an Open House

Open houses are a great opportunity to showcase your home to potential buyers. Since this will likely be the first time a buyer is seeing your home, it is important to put your best foot forward. Take time to clean the house, remove any clutter, and ensure there aren’t any lingering smells prior to the open house. It is also smart to secure any personal belongings or anything of value to ensure safe keeping. An agent will show the property to the people interested in it during the open house, but, since you know your house best, it might be good if you to tour the agent around the home prior to the open house so you can point out things you would like highlighted to potential buyers.

5. Review an offer

Once an offer has been submitted, your real estate agent will review it with you. The agent will discuss the pros and cons of the offer and can discuss how it compares based on the current market climate. The agent can help make recommendations on how to proceed (i.e., accept, reject, or counteroffer) along with the reasoning/benefits of each to help ensure you make a decision you are happy with!

6. The Home Appraisal

If you’ve reached a purchase agreement, you can expect an appraiser to visit your property. Why? Well, these professionals ensure that the negotiated price is suitable to the actual value of the house, meaning that the buyer or buyer’s lender could send them. You must ensure that the house is clean, decluttered, and organized, and you should also keep in mind that you’ll want to cooperate with them completely.

7. Prepare for Inspections

Besides an appraiser, you’ll also be visited by an inspector. Like with the previous professional, you’ll want to cooperate with them when scheduling the home inspection. The inspector is responsible for finding any defects with the property—they are mostly looking to ensure everything “operates as intended”. For example, if they find a crack in your walls, foundation, or roof, you may have to fix the problem and in some cases, the buyer could back out of the agreement you made. Hence, ensure that everything is up to par and that you disclose any known issues to the buyer prior to going under contract.

8. The Closing

The last step in the process is the closing deal. Once you and the buyer are sure about the condition and price of the home, your attorney can finally prepare all the documents needed for the closing meeting. Keep in mind, you should be ready to review a lot of paperwork, and once you verify that everything is okay and when you consult the other side, your house will finally be sold.

Conclusion

As you can see, the process of selling a house can be and often is quite complex and daunting. However, by following the steps we’ve mentioned in our guide above, you won’t only make the process simpler and quicker, but you’ll also ensure that you can sell the property for a better price without any hindrances along the way.

Since you’re now aware of the things that you could – and definitely should – choose to do, our experts recommend that you don’t lose any more time. Instead, return to the beginning of our list, and start with the first tip we’ve mentioned – which is finding a suitable and experienced real estate agent.