With an annual rate of 4.81 million home sales in the United States, many people plan to sell their houses. However, selling a house comes with many complications that the seller did not expect and makes many mistakes. Here are some mistakes to avoid when selling your home.
Six Mistakes to Avoid When Selling Your Home
Mistakes are a part of life and business. However, you can prevent mistakes if you know what to avoid. Below are some common mistakes to avoid when selling your home.
1. Not Hiring a Real Estate Agent
Around eight to ten percent of people in the US do not hire a real estate agent and live to regret it. There is a reason why the majority of home sellers choose a real estate agent.
A good real estate agent like Robert Defalco Realty keeps your wants and needs above everything else. Real estate agents can help make a lot of the home selling processes easier and quicker.
A professional agent can find buyers, negotiate sales, stage homes, help in renovations, research the market, calculate profitability, and carry out all legal requirements.
The market knowledge, experience, contacts, and abilities of a real estate agent pay for themselves and then some. One of the biggest mistakes to avoid when selling your home is working on your own.
2. Not Expecting Selling Costs
You might be under the idea that since you are the seller, you only need to watch the money come your way. However, there are many costs that the seller should expect, or you might be disappointed with the money you left at the sale’s end. Some selling costs to expect include:
- Staging/Renovation Cost: Before selling a home, you need to make it look appealing to the buyer, and to do so, you would need to stage your home or renovate it. This includes painting the walls, making repairs, moving the furniture to open the space, and more. According to the National Association of Realtors, the average staging cost is around $1500.
- Homes Inspection Cost: Before putting up your house for sale, you would need to pay a few hundred dollars for home inspections, increasing the credibility and chances of selling your house.
- Negotiation Costs: You are bound to negotiate with eh seller and offer some concessions if you want the full price. This includes incentives like warranties, appliances, covering all closing costs, etc.
- Closing Costs: Closing costs refer to the cost that includes the title transfer fee, legal fees, and sales tax. Closing costs for the seller can be around three percent.
3. Wrong Pricing
The biggest factor in buying or selling a house is the cost of the house itself. Pricing the house is a crucial step; pricing it wrong is one of the most significant mistakes to avoid when selling your home.
Pricing a house would discourage potential buyers and give you unrealistic expectations. It can also mean that your home will stay on the market for a while as you lower the price and it finally sells. In a survey, 70% of real estate agents revealed that overpricing is sellers’ biggest mistake.
To price a house, you must do a comparative market analysis, comparing the price of similar homes recently sold in the neighborhood. Your real estate agent can also do the market analysis.
Pricing it too low can also be problematic as it would not bring much profitability. However, low pricing isn’t a problem as it will attract buyers and start a bidding war, boosting the sale’s price.
4. Not Knowing When To Sell
Certain seasons are the peak selling seasons. Generally, the real estate market is much faster in summer and spring than in winter. The cold weather makes people want to stay at home and be lazy, while others are more tied up in social engagements that usually happen in the winter.
Hence, fewer buyers are coming around in the winter. However, that also means that fewer competitors are trying to sell. Additionally, it’s better to sell your home fast than to wait a month for summer to come around.
5. Cutting Costs on Listing Photos
The introduction of the online market has made it easier for people to view homes at home. More people prefer looking at homes online before deciding to visit them on-site. Hence, the first time any potential buyer will see your home and determine whether they like it is when they see pictures of it online.
Hence, one of the biggest mistakes to avoid when selling your home is not to salvage your way through listing photos. We are not saying that you need top-quality images from an expensive camera, but poor pictures do not help attract buyers.
Consider taking the photo in as much natural light as possible during the day. Angle the images to show the best parts of your house, or try taking a wide-angle picture. You can also hire a professional real estate photographer. Additionally, you can upload a video of a tour of the house.
Robert Defalco Realty has an online listing page where they can show off your house to potential buyers so you can sell it as quickly as possible.
6. Focusing on Renovation Instead of Repair
Renovations are a great way to boost house appeal to potential buyers, but they seldom increase the house price. They don’t even offer a 100% ROI most of the time. Additionally, renovations can be expensive.
One of the major mistakes to avoid when selling your home is to focus on renovations rather than repairs. A fully functioning house is better than a good-looking one.
How Robert Defalco Realty Can Help
Found more than 35 years ago, Robert Defalco Realty has more than three hundred trained real estate agents that can help inform you about the mistakes to avoid when selling your home. With its experience and work ethic, Robert Defalco Realty has amassed over a billion dollars a year in sales in Staten Island alone.
Contact them today by calling them at 718-987-7900 or filling out their form here. You can visit their offices all over New York and New Jersey for a face-to-face meeting. SSSSSS
