3 minute read
Some things are best not to DIY
Getting stuck into those great DIY projects you’ve always wanted to try – like changing the look and feel of a room with a coat of paint, upgrading outdated handles, replacing the torn flyscreens, taking a plunger to the blocked drains, creating a herb and vegetable garden, or setting up a worm farm – can be incredibly rewarding and cost-effective.
However, there are some things best left to people with experience – like surgeons, electricians and mechanics (for most of us). And, when it comes to selling your high value asset – your house… the real estate agent.
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Selling your home without the help of a real estate agent might seem like a good idea if you focus on commission; but, in saving those dollars, what responsibilities are you taking on and what expertise will you suddenly gain to deal with all aspects of the real estate transaction?
When it comes to the whole DIY home sale, let’s start at the very beginning: preparing the property for sale.
The house doesn’t just need to be tidy; its condition should appeal to the greatest buyer pool. This involves repairs, decluttering, possibly painting and decorating, and a professional house clean. That’s inside and out.
What’s your marketing experience? Will you know how to get your property listing in front of the right buyer audience? Can you access all the marketing channels of an agent, who quite possibly has the buyer waiting in their extensive database?
In dealing with potential buyers, the agent handles a lot of enquiries coming from very diverse starting points. You would not only have to be ready and able to deal with questions, stay on top of calls and emails, and be prepared to show the property at the interested party’s convenience, you would need to know all the answers.
If the DIY seller doesn’t understand how to ‘qualify’ buyers, valuable time can be wasted. Agents screen potential purchasers, finding out, for example, if the interested person has been pre-approved for a loan or needs to sell their house first.
A property inspection may result in potential buyers identifying some ‘problems’. This happens – and the owner doesn’t always agree! The agent is better able to mediate in such matters than the DIY owner, who may not ‘see’ the problems or be willing to fix them.
And it is all too easy for a homeowner to put pressure on the potential buyer when all they want is to be left alone to view the property and fear they may say the wrong thing to the owner.
Pricing your home correctly is incredibly difficult to get right if you don’t have the experience, and it is probably the number one trap that DIY sellers fall in to.
Negotiations with the potential buyer over price are even more problematic when an owner has unreasonable expectations.
When things get to the contract stage, how comfortable would you be as a DIY seller? Clauses, contingencies … There is a lot at stake, so if you are not confident in your ability to prepare or review all documentation required for a property sale, don’t try to go it alone.
If you are lucky enough to get the offer you want, things can still go very wrong; and an easily made mistake in the process after an offer is accepted may lead to failure of the whole process. When selling without a real estate agent, you might end up with less in hand, even considering that saving on commission.
The agent is more likely than the DIY seller to have multiple buyers bidding for the property and may well achieve significantly more than the asking price.
