How Pricing Your Home too High Can Prevent a Quick Sale

After you've compared your home to several similar homes in a similar area and are pretty sure you know what it might sell for, resist the temptation to set your price more than a few percent above or below that figure. Putting your home on the market at the correct price is the best way to make sure that the right buyers will see your home.

Because of the amounts of money involved in a home purchase, typical homebuyers only want to look at homes that they know are in the price range they can realistically afford. Chances are they've been looking at quite a few homes recently, and have a pretty good idea of the kind of home they're qualified to purchase. If you price your home too high, expecting that a potential buyer will negotiate with you, you may be disappointed. Homebuyers qualified to pay your initial asking price are looking for homes that actually are in that price range, and are likely to walk away without making you an offer.

Should You Sse a Real Estate Agency?

There are two reasons why someone might not want to use a real estate agent to sell their home. One is that you may be uncomfortable with strangers walking through your home when you're not there, and that's a legitimate concern. Statistically, however, the chances of theft or damage to your home are extremely low, and every year millions of homes are sold this way without incident. But if you don't need to sell your home within a certain time frame, having your privacy may be worth the extra time it may take to sell your own home.

Of course, for most people, the main reason to sell your own home is to save the cost of the real estate agents' commission. Depending on which state you live in the commission on a home sale can be as much as 7%, paid by the seller, which is a lot of money. The fact is, most sellers who try to sell their own homes end up using an agent anyway when they realize how much work it can be and their home still hasn't sold. But if you've priced your home right and are good at marketing, you could very well be one of the homeowners who successfully sell their home this way.

If you do decide to list your home with a real estate agent one of the biggest advantages is that your home will become part of the Multiple Listing Service database, where all the real estate agents in your area will see it as soon as it goes on the market. Because buyers don't pay a commission, most work with an agent who decides what homes to show them based on their requirements. This could make your home available to literally hundreds more potential buyers than if you were to advertise it yourself.