Given the not-too-cheerful market at the moment, it will be great if we can save some commission…Does anyone tried selling their property privately online? We are not interested in having an open house.
Found this website, has anyone use them? They charge $440 upfront and said the ad will be up until sold. Has anyone had any experience with them? They also told me that they will post the property to realestate.com.au.
http://www.propertynow.com.au/sell-my-own-house-27.aspx
Thanks in advance.
Or just post the details in the ozbargain forums :D
Yes I have used this same service previously.
It is legit in that :
1) This ad will only cost $440.
2) Your property will appear in the websites normally reserved for properties going through agents.
3) Any leads from these adverts will be redirected to you via their message service.
We used this service and also used Gumtree.
In the end the lead that made the sale came from Gumtree, but that is not to say this is useless.
I think this service gives a great deal of exposure for $440. The only missing is an agent doing home opens. No issue at all.
Just make sure you have all the relevant documentation should a potential buyer wish to make an offer. Find yourself a helpful Settlement Agent (one that understands that you are selling privately and is happy to do that little extra to guide you).
Shop around for Settlement Agents too….you can easily get 40% off their initial fee.
Thanks Surfer. That is good to know.
Trying to save on property selling expenses can be very expensive. I bought a property from a deceased estate. It had gone to auction with no real bids. We offered a take it or leave it to the agent a couple of weeks after auction. It was accepted. I paid $950K. It was worth over $1.3 and someone would have bought it at that price, if they had known about it. (The thing is that with a deceased estate, pretty much everyone has to agree on the selling expenses. So when you have 4 or 5 beneficiaries, there will always be some tight ass that doesn't want to agree to an appropriate budget. If the others don't insist, then the tightest ass wins and the sale is compromised.)
You are foolish not to have a home open with an agent. Very few people want to deal with the owner. Even fewer people want a private viewing with the owner. Ummm…..potential for yuck…much.
If your house does not come with at least a shared commission for a selling agent, area agents will bag it when buyers ask them to compare some other property to yours.
You will achieve a lower sales price when you:
do not advertise appropriately
do not make prospective buyers comfortable by offering a buffer between you and them with an agent and open housees when you and every member of your household and every stinking pet is gone from the property
insist that some rooms can not be entered, for any reason whatsoever
piss off area agents by excluding them from a commission
When I used to run a business with my ex, one whole employee spent their whole day sourcing properties from people who were selling their own home to save expenses. Sometimes we would do a bit of work on them, sometimes not. Then we would resell from a profit. Think about that. We would be able to pay buying and selling costs, including agents fees and taxes and settlement agents and pay an employee and pay interest costs and we still made enough money to make it very worthwhile. All from people like you who were silly enough to step over dollars to pick up pennies.
Guess how we sold properties???? Through an area agent!
Real estate agents are absolute lying pricks who will gleefully sell you down the river. But it is better to let them screw you a little than screwing yourself a lot. They at least have experience at it.
If you can find a right buyer, you could save around 6-7% of the selling price.
Best thing is drop some mails in your street, informing your willingness to sell the property privately. We never know our neighbours may be interested to buy for their relatives.