You don’t need a real estate agent to sell your home!
Real Estate Myth
Written by Leigh Martinuzzi
The truth is that you don’t! Just as you can sell your car, your radio, and your rarely used jetski online, so can you sell your home or investment property. There is no license or government permission required in selling your home. However, there are many good reasons why it is beneficial to use an agent.
Your home is likely your biggest asset. For this reason, you want to do everything you can to maximise the sale potential of your property. The benefits of choosing a real estate agent are numerous. Firstly, they are responsible for the entire sales process from getting professional photos organised to final negotiations with potential buyers. It is not as simple as putting a for sale sign in the front yard and hoping for the best. That’s what cheap agents do. Good real estate agents provide a great deal of skill and expertise and know-how to achieve the very best price when it comes to selling a property.
You may have a marketing background. You may be a great communicator. You might consider yourself an excellent negotiator. And I am sure you know a lot about your home and the area you live in. However, with that being said, there are many nuances to successfully selling real estate. Perhaps the biggest obstacle is the emotional attachment most homeowners have to their homes. This can place added pressure and difficulty in final negotiations with a buyer. Having a mediator or agent as a middle man assists to avoid the tension of back and forth discussions made about very large sums of money.
You may wish to save money and not pay an agent’s commission yet sometimes this could result in offers and a final contract price much less than what you could have achieved using an agent. Skillful agents are often able to cover their fees in negotiations. The result may and often does cost homeowners more than they save. Buyers are savvy too and want to pay the cheapest price they can when buying a home. When buyers see real estate that is for sale by the owner (FSBO) it gives them a reason to offer less than market value because they know the owners are not paying agent fees.
In summary, you do not need a real estate agent to help you in the sale of your home. If you are a smart and savvy property owner and happy to deal with the entire sales process in an effort to save some money on commission, go for it! Before you do, I would recommend speaking to a professional real estate agent or consultant to understand the complexities of the sales process to unlock your property’s full potential. It might just save you a great deal of stress, pain, and expense.
