Many Australians tend to move every 5 to 7 years from their home, selling it. Motivation and determination are two main factors influencing home sellers’ decision to put their home (a significant asset) on the market.
Sometimes sell my house decision is made due to:
- Inability to afford it anymore
- Separation from the partner
- Sudden rise in the home loan rates which makes the mortgage repayment difficult task
- Job loss
- Illness and inability to work
- Desire to downsize
- Growing family necessitating a shift to a bigger home
- Relocating to a different state or country
Whichever may be your reason for your home sale decision, thorough knowledge of home selling options is necessary. But if you aren’t aware of selling ways, you are at the right place to gain insight into various home selling options in Australia.
- SELLING IT BY YOURSELF (FSBO or ‘for sale by owner’)
This is a perfectly legal and non-complicated Home selling procedure where you save thousands of dollars from being paid to agents commissions. However, it requires formulating a clear strategy and understanding of various marketing campaign elements so that you can attract the best offers for the property.
Lets evaluate pros and cons of your ‘sell my house without an agent’ decision
Advantages
- Saves on thousands of dollars in agents commission
- Have complete control and responsibility for the financial transaction
Disadvantages
- Even though you save money on commission, very likely, you would receive lesser cash for your property than you should.
- Real estate agents have more extensive experience and knowledge of selling a property (being their day job) and handling legal procedures like liaising with buyers, conducting open homes, negotiating price upward, and closing the deal. As a novice home seller, you would have to invest a lot of time and effort in home selling.
- As you don’t have a broader marketing network in real estate market, you can’t attract more potential buyers. However, agents have their database of potential buyers interested in your property and the agency’s website and connection with other agents that facilitate quick home selling.
- Advertising, marketing, legal documents preparation and requirement fulfillment involves cost and the risk of getting wrong which can jeopardize the home sale.
- Selling online for free
The sell my house online facilities is very trending in Australia nowadays. Numerous portals exist for selling a property where you can list your home, e.g., domain.com.au, homesales.com.au, realestate.com.au, realestateview.com.au, thehomepage, etc.
Choose a website to list your home for sale, understand its listing process and find out buyers directly, without involving an agent.
You may choose multiple listings of your home to increases your reach to potential buyers.
- Selling online for a small fee
DIY websites can help you list your home to ‘sell my house myself’ against a small fee. The fee and conditions of such sites vary. So, compare their costs with the inclusions along with their fine print.
- SELLING HOME WITH AN AGENT
The most viable option for home selling is taking the help of a real estate agent. Armed with experience, connection options, and time-tested strategies, they offer various benefits. However, some drawbacks also entail this option.
Advantages
- Save you time and efforts
The agent indulges in a marketing campaign like online advertising, internet marketing, newspaper advertisements, placing signs, board and flyers.
They also research the appropriate property price, meet buyers at open for inspections, procure follow-up from potential buyers, and finally close the deal. Thus, an agent saves a lot of the home seller’s time and efforts.
- Navigate and handle the paperwork professionally.
With their expertise and knowledge, an excellent real estate agent handles the legal paperwork aspect of the home sale process with ease and surety on time.
- Negotiate with buyer
Real estate agents help benefit from their negotiation skills while dealing with the buyer.
- Value for home precisely
With their professional and complex system of networks, real estate agents can help value your home precisely. Also, they have access to broader online databases (by having access to big portals- being licensed real estate agents with the agency) to help achieve an ideal sale price for your home.
Disadvantages
High commission paid to the agent ranging from 2- 2.5% of the final purchase price, or a set fee ranging between $6,000 and $15,000 for negotiating a sale is the biggest disadvantage of hiring a real estate agent for home selling.
- Auction
Bidding at auction is marked by highly competitive tendency to drive higher sale prices.
An excellent real estate agent can advise about selling a property at an auction. S/he can organize and run multiple online auctions in a day. Via online auctions, sellers can follow the interactive bidding easily and live.
- Off-market selling
As marketing and advertising home selling involve costs for the seller, they may choose off-market selling. Here home selling is done without advertising the property. Agents privately contact interested potential buyers.
- Selling to investor or developer
If your home is teardown and/or on a large lot, an agent can help find an investor or developer interested in flipping your home.
CONCLUSION
Private selling of your home might appear a more accessible and lucrative option, saving tens of thousands of commission dollars paid to estate agents. Yet, it is by no means a cakewalk.
There is a myriad of ways selling a home privately can backfire. And, the final result can be more expensive than hiring an experienced agent. Also, to sell my house Melbourne may take a longer route than it would have with an agent.
As per recent reports, only 1% of Australian home sellers opt to sell without using a real estate agent because of the complications involved in the entire process.
If you’re giving sell my house privately option a thought, try speaking to a real estate agent at least once.
Before choosing your estate agent for home selling, compare the top-performing estate agents in your area because only the experienced and the best agent can help walk away with your sale price goals.