Pros and Cons of Hiring a Realtor to Sell a Home
When it comes to buying or selling a home, everyone wants to save money. Hiring a realtor mean that you need to pay them. Realtors often charge the buyer and seller of a home a certain percentage. This percentages varies from between 1% to 2% in the UAE and it can go as high as 6% for other countries. But the realtor helps you in purchasing or selling your home even if it take weeks or months. If you want to sell a home or buy a home, then you must be uncertain on whether you should consider a real estate agent or not.
Pros of Selling a Home without a Realtor
If you are selling a home and want to be careful about the cost, then it’s probably a good idea to go without a realtor. Here are a few advantages of going without a real estate agent.
- There Is A Flexibility In Pricing
When you decide to sell a property without the help of a real estate agent, you can be flexible with the pricing. Since you are not going to pay any extra amount of money on commission, both the buyer and seller can benefit from the flexibility in price. With the price flexible, you can sell a home fast since you are satisfied with the profits.
- You Don’t have to Deal with a Middleman
Working directly with the home seller or the buyer, makes it easy for you to convey your message. With no real estate agent involved, you are sure that your interests are being shared. You can easily negotiate and save time. Eliminating the middleman saves you the time of waiting for follow up calls and lets you close the deal faster. In some cases not hiring a realtor allows you to sell a home fast.
- You Can Negotiate Properly
When you deal with home buyers directly, you have the upper hand when it comes to negotiation. This is because you can see the emotional attachment of the buyer. Without the real estate agent, you can stage your home to fit your taste. In most cases you can stage your home better than the realtor. A well-staged home, you can attract potential buyers and make them love your home. If a home buyer gets attached to your home, you can use it to your advantage.
- You have more knowledge.
When buying a home without a real estate agent, you tend to have more knowledge on the home. You don’t need a realtor to tell you the details of a home. If you are buying a home from someone you know, then you have the first and knowledge of your home. Having knowledge of the home lets you price your home well. A correctly priced home can be sold quickly.
Cons of Selling a Home without a Realtor
Just as there are benefits of selling a home solo, there are disadvantages too. There are a lot of technicalities involved in selling a home. Things you may overlook will not escape a professional real estate agents. There are more disadvantages of selling a home without a real estate agent than there are advantages. Here are a few cons of selling a home without a realtor.
- Difficult to Handle Paper Work
There is a lot of paper work involved in purchasing and selling a home. Most of the times, you won’t know what documents are required to sell a home. In order to secure a buyer, you need to have a knowhow on what papers and documents you need to sell a home. A professional real estate agent knows about the documents and paper work that will close the deal. In most cases, real estate agents complete the paper work quickly. This saves you the trouble of doing runs to complete paper work.
- You Might Have Difficulty In Decision Making
With the help of a real estate agent, you will have someone to help you in decision making. Real estate agents know the market more than you and can guide you on the best price to sell your home. Most real estate agents give the right advice, especially because they have their own interests too. A realtor also gives you advice on renovations necessary to give a buyer a good impression. They also have an insight on home loans and mortgages to help you make a decision. If you decide to sell your home without a realtor, then you will have difficulty in making decisions.
- You Might Not Know the History of a Home
Real estate agents help you by giving you insights of a home. If you are buying or selling a home without the help of a realtor, then you might have problems. Not knowing everything about a home you are about to buy might be a wrong decision. A realtor might know about certain paper work or home loan that the seller might have problems with, not knowing such details might lead you to a bad deal.
- Hidden Expenses
Without the help of a realtor, you might not know about the hidden expenses involved in selling a home. Real estate agents are experienced and know exactly how much of extra cost you might face when you want to sell a home.
- Selling a Home Can Take Time
Selling a home without a real estate professional can take a lot of time. It may take a lot of time especially because you will need to remove time from your work or job to be able to entertain potential buyers. When buying or selling a home, you will need to invest a lot of time into searching for homes to buy and potential buyers. A real estate agent helps you sell your home fast. They have a large network and know a lot of people that are interested in buying homes. They also help in staging a home which saves you time.
- Learning about a Community or Neighborhood Can Be Difficult
If you sell your home solo, you will have to do a lot of research on the neighborhood and the community you want to buy your home from. A real estate agent will have a lot of information and can guide you on whether or not the neighborhood is good. If you have children, you will need to consider the schools in the community, a realtor will be able to advice and guide you in learning about a community.
If you consider selling a home without the help of a realtor, then you need to make sure you have detailed information on the property. Selling a home is quite a challenging and time consuming task. Hiring a realtor will make things easy and hassle free for you.
