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For Sale By Owner
As a free service to help you sell your property
yourself we have the capability to put your home's information including pictures
into a special Properties Listings section of our award-winning Real
Estate web site:
LawrenceYerkes.com
We are targeting well over a 100,000 visitors looking for homes and other
property in the South Jersey and real estate information. A lot of these
potential buyers are moving here from out of town and you would normally have no
way way to reach them.
There is no cost or obligation to anyone wishing to attempt to sell their own
property without a real estate agent.
Why would a professional Realtor offer such a service you may ask?
It's very simple. We know from my many years of experience in selling our own
properties, and from industry sales statistics, that not everyone that tries to sell on their own are
successful and a significant number eventually end up hiring a Realtor to get
the job done for them.
By offering you this free, no obligation service now we hope to have the
opportunity to earn your business should you choose to hire a Realtor to help
get your home sold.
As a real estate professional we have all the tools, knowledge, support and
education to get the job done for you and to get your property sold as quickly
as possible at the best price.
If you're ready to get started marketing your home, free of charge, on one of
the potentially most visited real estate web sites in this area, please give
Larry a call at his home (609-953-1330) or
e-mail us; we'll even come
over and make the photos for you at no charge.
We promise there will be no high pressure tactics used to try to list your house,
just a sincere effort to help you.
You might also want to review our list of "40 Free or inexpensive tips to make
your home show better and put more money in your pocket" included below; or
look at the articles under the heading "Getting Your House Ready to Sell"
available at the link titled "ABC's (of Buying/Selling)" under the "Real Estate
Library" section (on the left).
Past experience has proven that the more things
you do to make your home appealing to potential buyers the faster it will sell
at a premium price.
Good luck with your sale!"
40 Free or inexpensive tips to make
your home show better and put more money in your pocket:
Outdoors
1. Be sure your lawn and shrubbery is kept trimmed at all times. Consider
removing overgrown trees and shrubs that hide the house from the street.
2. Keep the garage doors down at all times.
3. For a touch of color, have seasonal flowers growing in beds and containers.
4. Make sure your driveway is in good repair. Pressure wash concrete drives
and walks to remove stains and car drippings, and put a fresh coat of
sealer on asphalt drives.
5. Make sure patios and decks are clean and in good repair. Replace any
rotten wood and nail down loose boards on decking or steps; pressure wash
if needed.
6. Garage sale time! Clear out everything you don't intend to keep and tidy
up what's staying. Make sure garage doors and openers are in proper
working order.
7.Check all railings and fencing to make sure it's in good repair and
freshly painted.
8. Pay special attention to the area around your front door; make sure your
doorbell works, clean all cobwebs, leaves, and other debris that may have
accumulated there. Give the front door a fresh coat of paint if needed;
paint is one of the most cost effective fix up items you can do.
9. Check for broken windows or leaking seals on thermo pane windows;
replace if necessary.
10. Clean all the cobwebs from around the front door. Make sure all
outdoor lighting (especially front porch) is clean and shiny; replace if
necessary. It is especially important that the entrance to your home make a
good first impression on prospective buyers. This sets the tone for the
whole showing.
11. Check your mailbox. Is it straight and upright? Neatly trimmed around?
12. Before you start indoors walk across the street in front of your house
and look back (like a buyer will see it). Does it present an appealing
appearance?
Indoors
13. Start by walking through the house and making a list. Do your carpets
need shampooing? Floors need a fresh coat of wax? Dust all ceiling fans
especially the blades and wash light
fixtures.
14. You're going to have to pack when you move anyway, so go through all
your closets and pack up everything you don't need for the next couple of
months. A closet with only a few neatly arranged items creates an
impression of abundant storage space.
15. Thin out overcrowded rooms. Ever notice the model homes sparse
furnishings? They make the rooms look larger. Consider renting a storage
facility to store excess lamps, tables, and large items that eat up space
in a room.
16.Go through and pack up most of your family pictures and collections of
model ships, stamps, quilts, or anything that might cause a buyer to stop
and look at your collections of stuff instead of your house.
17.Check all light fixtures to make sure all the bulbs burn. Use the
largest wattage bulb that you safely can to give off more light.
18. Wash all your windows and make sure window treatments are clean and in
good repair. Keep the window coverings open whenever possible to let in
more light.
19. With a good degreaser, wipe down everything in the kitchen so it feels
clean to the touch. Clean your stove and oven; replace stove eye pans if needed.
20. Go through your kitchen cabinets and pantry to make sure they're neat
and tidy; give any food that you don't plan to use right away to the local
food pantry.
21.Make sure your sinks are clean at all times and free of dirty dishes and
utensils.
22. Remove all excess items from your counters to give the impression of
lots of work surface.
23. Pleasing aromas add to the appealing atmosphere we're trying to
establish for your buyers; consider keeping a saucepan of potpourri on the
stove to give off an appealing scent.
24.Clean all light switch places by taking them off and washing with soap
and water; replace if necessary.
25.Make sure the bathrooms are spotless at all times with fresh towels,
decorative soaps, and all fixtures are shiny, scrubbed, and in good repair.
26. Check all faucets and shower heads to make sure they're spotless and
free of leaks and drips.
27. Repaint interior rooms if needed with neutral colors.
28.Don't forget your ceilings too; years of living in a home with cooking,
smoking, and other everyday activities can stain ceilings. Paint ages;
repaint if needed.
29. Don't have large, space eating house plants sitting around; give them
away or ask a neighbor to store them until you move.
31.The more light you can get into a room the bigger and more spacious the
room will appear. When you leave for a showing, turn on lights in rooms
that are normally darker than you would like and make sure the window
coverings are open to admit outside light.
32. An old decorator trick to bring in more light as well as make rooms
appear larger are mirrors; either hanging on a wall or on a stand.
33. Pack away and store out of season clothes. Get rid of extra hangars.
Straighten up your shoes (consider some inexpensive shoe racks from a
discount store like K-Mart or Wal-Mart).
34. When painting don't forget the interiors of closets and the closets
doors; make sure all closet and interior doors open and close correctly.
35. Check where ceilings meet wall and clean all cobwebs, this is a
commonly overlooked area when cleaning, along with tops of tall furniture
items such as hutches, entertainment centers, etc.
36. If you have a pet make sure there are no odors. You may not notice
odors since you live with your pet every day, have a neutral third party
give your home a "sniff" test for objectionable odors that may turn buyers off.
37. Also, when buyers come to visit, keep your pet under control, or better
yet, get a friend or neighbor to "pet sit" for you while the buyers are
looking.
38. It's important that you leave the house for all showings. Buyers feel
less inhibited if you're not around and will usually take a closer look in
closets and in kitchen cabinets, as well as voice any objections that your
agent can then deal with. If the buyers won't make comments because you're
following them around pointing things out then your agent can't deal with
any potential problems that may hinder making an offer.
39. If you have several vehicles make sure the spot closest to the door
buyers enter through is empty for them.
40. Freshly baked or even store bought cookies & little snacks along with
an appropriate beverage (hot in winter, cold in summer) along with a sign
saying "Please Sit Down and Enjoy a Treat While You're Here" will make your
home more memorable even if they don't take anything. Remember little
things can go a long way towards getting your home sold quickly for the
best price.
Compliments of:
Lawrence Yerkes
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Comments and Questions to Consider
Many homeowners believe that to
maximize their home sale they should sell it themselves. At first glance, they
feel selling a home is simple and why should they pay a broker fees for
something they could do themselves? In fact, close to 10% of all the homes sold
last year were sold for sale by owner (FSBO).
However, close to half of the FSBO's said that they would hire a professional
next time they sold. Thirty percent said they were unhappy with the results they
achieved by choosing FSBO. Why?
Many FSBO's told us the time, paperwork and everyday responsibilities
involved were not worth the amount of money they saved in commissions. For
others, the financial savings were even more disappointing. By the time they
figured the amount of fees paid to outside consultants, inspectors, appraisers,
title lawyers, escrow and loan officers, marketing, advertising... they would
have been better off to have paid the broker's fee which would have included
many of these charges up front.
Selling a home requires an intimate understanding of the real estate market.
If the property is priced too high, it will sit and develop a reputation for
being a problem property. If the property is priced too low, you will cost
yourself serious money. Some FSBO's discovered that the lost money as a result
of poor decisions outweighed the commission.
Before you decide to sell FSBO, consider these questions and weigh the
answers of assuming the responsibility versus employing a professional. A little
time spent investigating up front will pay off tenfold in the end. Did You Know?
According to National Association of REALTORS® 2004 Profile of Home Sellers and Buyers: . . . the typical FSBO home sold for $163,800, compared to $189,000 for agent-assisted home sales.
This price gap is due in part to the benefits that an agent-assisted sale provides: Access to a bigger and wider markets resulting in increased competition for the property, more extensive and effective advertising, better pricing analysis, stronger negotiation skills and
experience in real estate sales. The Profile also identified:
The Most Difficult Tasks for FSBO
Sellers (in descending difficulty):
Getting the right price,
Understanding paperwork,
Preparing/fixing up home for sale,
Attracting potential buyers,
Having enough time to devote to all aspects of the sale.
QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER
Do I have the time, energy, know how, and ability to devote a full forced
effort to sell my home?
One of the keys to selling your home efficiently and profitably is complete
accessibility. Many homes have sat on the market much longer than necessary
because the owner was unwilling or unavailable to show the property. Realize
that a certain amount of hours each day is necessary to sell your home.
Am I prepared to deal with an onslaught of buyers who perceive FSBO's as
targets for low balling?
One of the challenges of selling a home is screening unqualified prospects
and dealing with lowballers. In a recent study, 30% of For Sale By Owners were
unhappy with the results they achieved by assuming the responsibility
themselves.
Am I offering financing options to the buyer? Am I prepared to answer
questions about financing?
One of the keys to selling, whether it's a home, a car... anything, is to
have all the necessary information the prospective buyer needs and to offer them
options. Think about the last time you purchased something of value, did you
make a decision before you had all your ducks in a row? By offering financing
options you give the home buyer the ability to work on their terms and open up
the possibilities of selling your home quicker and more profitably. A
professional real estate agent will have a complete team, from lenders to title
reps for you to utilize...they'll be at your disposal.
Do I fully understand the legal ramifications and necessary steps required
in selling a home?
Many home sales have been lost due to incomplete paperwork, lack of
inspections or not meeting your states disclosure laws. Are you completely
informed of all the steps necessary to sell real estate? If not, a professional
would be a wise choice.
Do I have the capability of handling the legal contracts, agreements and
any disputes with buyers before or after the offer is presented?
Ask yourself if you are well versed in legalese and if you are prepared to
handle disputes with buyers. To avoid any disputes it is wise to put all
negotiations and agreements in writing. Many home sales have been lost due to
misinterpretation of what was negotiated.
Have I contacted the necessary professionals... title, inspector (home and
pest), attorney, and escrow company?
Are you familiar with top inspectors and escrow companies? Don't randomly
select inspectors, attorneys, and title reps. Like any profession there are
inadequate individuals who will slow, delay and possibly even cost you the
transaction.
If these questions raise some concerns you may want to speak with a
professional.
We sincerely hope these tips and ideas are of value to you. If there is any
way we can be of service please contact our office... we would consider it a
privilege to serve you!
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