How to Maximize the Sale of Your Home

Here are the seven keys to selling quickly and for top dollar.

They say even a turkey can fly in a wind storm, and when it comes to selling a home in  a hot market, this is the cold hard truth. But, there's selling a home, and there's engineering a process that maximizes the sale netting you tens of thousands more and with better terms. Today's video is about how we do this for our seller clients. Sellers know the market is slanted in their favor, but they want to ensure that they’re not leaving any money on the table. How do you get the best possible price and terms in today’s fast-paced environment? Here are seven steps that every home seller should follow to put themselves in the most advantageous position possible: 

1. Detail your property’s exterior. Hire companies like Shack Shine to come power wash your home so that it sparkes from the outside. First impressions are everything in real estate; an immaculate exterior gets buyers excited to see what’s on the inside. 

2. Consult a staging professional. We offer a complimentary staging service that you’ll want to take advantage of. The art of staging is all about working with—or, in some cases, around—your home’s existing features to create the most aesthetically pleasing presentation possible. Prior to this consultation, get ahead of things by decluttering and depersonalizing your home. 

3. Discuss your pricing strategy well in advance of listing. Are you wanting to price your home ahead of the market in the hope that you’ll eventually arrive closer to an optimistic sale price? Or, are you trying to create the auction effect, where 10 or more buyers all throw their hats in the ring? Sit down with your agent and review the potential impact of the many different pricing strategies. 

"Subject-free offers are the Holy Grail when it comes to selling your property."

4. Discuss your offer strategy. Don’t wait until offers are coming in to decide what your strategy will be for handling them. Are you going to hold off on reviewing offers until you’ve allowed for a bunch of showings? Are you willing to consider an offer on day one? If you don’t have a plan going into this stage, you’ll get caught up with what we call ‘bully offers.’ These are buyers who just want to tie the property up, sight unseen. 

5. Run an awareness campaign one to two weeks before hitting the market. We call this our ‘coming soon period.’ It translates to a sign topper in front of the home, some targeted Facebook ads, and some conversations between your agent and other reputable agents around town. Everyone needs to know your home is coming to market soon. 

6. Bottleneck showings. Action creates reaction. Have your agent change the settings on Touchbase (that’s our showing software) to allow 15-minute windows instead of hour-long windows, then stack all the showings back to back throughout a chosen period over the weekend. That’s the best way to foster competition among buyers. Ideally, you’d hit the market on a Thursday, have tons of 15-minute showings throughout the weekend, then reap a bunch of offers on Sunday or Monday for review. 

7. Get a pre-listing home inspection. Yes, at about $500, this is expensive. Perhaps it will highlight some major issues in the home that need fixing. Regardless, a pre-listing inspection is highly marketable; it shows that you’re an open book and gives people the confidence to potentially come in with subject-free offers. In a sense, you’ve preemptively taken away some of the buyer’s leverage. 

So there you have it—seven steps to maximizing your home sale in 2021. If you’re contemplating a spring or summer sale, let’s get the conversation started today. We’d love to hear about your specific needs and work to create an actionable plan that helps you reach your goals. We hope to hear from you soon.