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All these responses are very interesting. I will be very interested in the outcome of the scenario at the house behind me, and I'll let y'all know. I am not advocating FSBO at all, and have never considered the possibility for myself.
If I were guessing, I would guess that the heirs are not in a hurry, since the owner died over a year ago, and are seeing what they can shake out of the bushes. If there is no mortgage, they can wait and see. If there is, then they will give it a month or two and then get serious with a realtor.
On the one hand, the neighborhood is desirable. On the other hand, the exposure to buyers is very limited.
One of our houses sold in two days, and I asked our realtor (jokingly) if we would get a discount. Her response was she was charging us double for excellent service.
Not an agent, but as a buyer this comment would bother me. Feel free to correct my math, but it seems like 1.5% of $260K is nearly $4000 better than offering zero.
Totally. I know nothing about how you real estate folks work, but if I am doing my thing and can pick up $4k for no effort, I wouldn't stick up my nose at it.
Totally. I know nothing about how you real estate folks work, but if I am doing my thing and can pick up $4k for no effort, I wouldn't stick up my nose at it.
Sure, I would not turn up my nose at $4000 for no effort. What does that have to do with real estate brokerage?
If you had shown 30 homes to a buyer over 5 weeks, run a CMA on 6 of them, written two offers that did not close, one that became a contract that terminated after an inspection which you attended, would that qualify as "no effort?"
There is no advantage. FSBOs take longer to sell (statistically) and sell for less (statistically) than houses on the MLS. And offering 1.5% to buyers' agents is about as good as offering 0.
I know I'll get slammed by everyone who thinks agents are worthless and you can sell your own home easily thanks to the internet, but that's just not reflected in the data. A huge majority of FSBOs will list with an agent within five weeks of trying to sell it themselves. There's a lot more to selling a house than putting a sign in the yard and opening the door.
You said it. I know of a condo FSBO here in a very desirable and popular community where the condos typically sell very quickly. They have it about $50K over priced and have been having Open Houses literally EVERY DAY for months. I sold the one next door to them in 10 days. They came over to say hello and chit chat, and I asked to see theirs. It was very nicely furnished and clean but I immediately caught several maintenance issues that should have been addressed. (so I pointed them out with my suggestions) Of course I asked them if they would consider listing and they said "oh no, we have all the time in the world". I hope so lady, because you're never gonna sell it at this price! Mine sold back in October I think it was, and this one is still sitting there, not sold.
You said it. I know of a condo FSBO here in a very desirable and popular community where the condos typically sell very quickly. They have it about $50K over priced and have been having Open Houses literally EVERY DAY for months. I sold the one next door to them in 10 days. They came over to say hello and chit chat, and I asked to see theirs. It was very nicely furnished and clean but I immediately caught several maintenance issues that should have been addressed. (so I pointed them out with my suggestions) Of course I asked them if they would consider listing and they said "oh no, we have all the time in the world". I hope so lady, because you're never gonna sell it at this price! Mine sold back in October I think it was, and this one is still sitting there, not sold.
if they tallied up all the time they've spent doing this themselves, it would probably be less than minimum wage.
There's a FSBO close to me who is $500,000 overpriced, which is about 25%. Owner doesn't live there, and in order to show it to any stragglers, he has to drive 40 miles round trip.
He priced it slightly below zestimate, but the zestimate is totally jacked up in my area.
I don't know how the hell zillow is coming up with these zestimates because none of the homes are selling even close to the zestimate.
Such a detriment zillow is. But these owners think Zillow is gospel.
Of course, you have people who think zestimate be damned. Check out this FSBO....
There is no advantage. FSBOs take longer to sell (statistically) and sell for less (statistically) than houses on the MLS. And offering 1.5% to buyers' agents is about as good as offering 0.
I know I'll get slammed by everyone who thinks agents are worthless and you can sell your own home easily thanks to the internet, but that's just not reflected in the data. A huge majority of FSBOs will list with an agent within five weeks of trying to sell it themselves. There's a lot more to selling a house than putting a sign in the yard and opening the door.
Plus you miss the chance for your buyers to be driven around in a Soccer Moms SUV while she wears her 90s power suit from last real job she had.
I sold my last two places in FSBOs, one after the listing agent could not sell it in six months. And after she did like four open houses and MLS it and the house was literally filed with cards from other brokers who showed it.
It was an estate sale so house was empty, but furnished and clean. We pulled listing, did our own open house and since saving on commission and we could focus 100% on your house we spent like $1,000 out of pocket on advertising in Three Major Newspapers, picked the perfect Spring Weekend and did two 8 Hour open houses on a Saturday and a Sunday back to back plus put signs up at all nearby train stations, and large signs pointing to open house all over.
Then we lowered price lower than the realtor suggested. Actually we priced it 100K less, Then we never mentioned it was a FSBO. We have four of us work the open house, all in business casual, sheets printed, did tour.
One minute before open house we got a cash offer. During that weekend we had 200 people tour house, 8 offers with the 8 offers we did a telephone auction to let them bid. We told everyone during open house we would sell house within 48 hours. Meaning we were accepting highest offer by 5pm Tuesday.
Well we sold it $50K higher than the highest offer with a realtor cash, no inpection as is. The guy who bought it came from our Mandarian version of ad.
Then realtor called from four months earlier asking for a cut of sale for all the work she did.
Our lawyer and buyer lawyer did all the work once we agreed on price. There was no work after we got the deal.
No dumb, appraisals, teminite checks, inspections, waiting on mortgage approval, lead tests, mold tests, absestos tests. All work the realtor would have "helped" use with if we took the 50K less offer and paid her a commission.
Sure, I would not turn up my nose at $4000 for no effort. What does that have to do with real estate brokerage?
If you had shown 30 homes to a buyer over 5 weeks, run a CMA on 6 of them, written two offers that did not close, one that became a contract that terminated after an inspection which you attended, would that qualify as "no effort?"
Silly me. I was under the impression that your goal would be to find me the house I'm looking for, not to only show me the houses that would yield the most return for you.
Silly me. I was under the impression that your goal would be to find me the house I'm looking for, not to only show me the houses that would yield the most return for you.
Again, the question: Is the scenario I described "no effort?"
I WOULD help you find and purchase the house that suited you the best, in features and price. It is what I do.
You would quite reasonably have the impression and expectations that I would give you the efforts, whether it be one home or 30.
It's like anything in life. A person can hire a "professional" to do a task or perform the tasks themselves. I quoted professional because in every field, their are different level of professional. A home owner may do a better job than some RE professional but that really depends on the particular home owner/agent. Every situation is different.
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