things to know when selling your home

Hiring A Great Realtor Is Extremely Important

"Aren’t all real estate agents the same?" Simple answer, nope.  When selling a home, you should expect the best from the person you hire to sell your home.  

Gather Information, Paperwork, and Documents

Here are some examples of the kind of information, paperwork, and documents a good realtor should gather before selling a home: roof age, furnace age, Central Air conditioning age, water heater age, included appliance ages, and any instruction manuals for everything listed.  

Dates of any home improvement projects, such as kitchen and bathroom remodel, window installation, hardwood/carpet installations, etc… the list goes on!

Choosing When To Sell Is Different For Everyone

Every real estate market is different.  There are great times to sell and other times that may not be the most ideal. The spring months may not always be the best time to sell for everyone.  There are several reasons why may actually be a better time to sell than waiting until spring.

When selling a home, it’s important that you sell your home when it’s most convenient for you, the person who will be moving from it.  It’s important that you evaluate all the pros and cons of each selling time frame.  A great Realtor should be able to give you both the positives and negatives of each time frame.

Inspecting A Home Before Selling

Before putting your home on the market, it can be a good idea to have a professional home inspector to perform an inspection on your home.  Whether a buyer is purchasing their first home or their fifth, it’s extremely likely they will make their offer contingent on an acceptable home inspection.  

Make sure that the home inspector who does the pre-listing inspection will provide you with a detailed report and also pictures relating to anything they note in their report.

Preparing Your Home For Sale Is Crucial

There are several things that should be done before putting your home on the market.  A great Realtor should point out during a walk-through of your home items that should be corrected or repaired with simple fixes such as painting, cleaning, and de-cluttering are just a handful of low-cost preparations that can be made, prior to selling a home. Let’s be honest, the first impression is always the most important.  You never want your home to lead to a bad first impression and cost you money in the long run

Pricing The Home Right From The Beginning Can Be The Difference

PRICING IS IMPORTANT!  If you price your home too high from the start, it can actually cost you lots of money in the future.  The price a home enters the market at will do the majority of the marketing.  It’s important to understand today’s buyers and know they are very educated and have tons of information at their fingertips.  It’s important that your Realtor know the market comparisons before selling a home.  

 Marketing is Key

People have to know your place is for sale if they’re going to buy it. Just dropping an “OPEN HOUSE” sign on the corner and putting an ad up on Craigslist isn’t going to do it. Find the agent who will do it all, there are so many different avenues to marketing, and getting a property in front of people is actually quite impressive. Your realtor should do more (like getting a featured listing on the front page of chicagodoorstep.com) to provide you the best service and to get you the most for your property, in the shortest amount of time possible. There are so many ways to do it, leave no stone unturned. Or better yet your agent should leave no stone unturned.