Jeff McRitchie is the director of marketing for www.MyBinding.com and lives in Hillsboro, Oregon. He writes extensively on topics related to Binding Machines, Binding Supplies, Report Covers, Binders, Index Tabs, Laminators, Laminating Pouches, Roll Film, Shredders, and Paper Handling Equipment.
If you are in a tough real estate market and are looking to sell your home quickly, you might want to consider doing a For Sale By Owner. My wife and I recently bought a new house and after trying unsuccessfully to sell our existing house through a real estate agent for several months decided to try For Sale by Owner. We found a buyer within four days and closed on the house three weeks later. However, through our experience we discovered a few things. Here are a few tips if you are considering a FSBO in a less than ideal real estate market.
1. Consider paying to have your home placed in the MLS. There are several companies out there that will do this for a few hundred dollars. With sales down, real estate agents are desperate to earn a commission. By putting the house in the MLS you are agreeing that if an agent brings a buyer to you that you will pay the agent their part of the commission (you still save the listing agents commission). If you can sell the house on your own with no agent then you won't have to pay an agent. However, in a tough market you want as many possible eyes on your property as possible.
2. Get the word out to as many places as possible about your house. One of the best places to do this is on the internet. There are dozens of free websites that will allow you to post your house for free. Consider starting with craigslist since it has so much traffic and then spread out to the other sites on the net. It will probably take you an entire evening to get the house posted on all the sites and you will want to keep a spreadsheet with your usernames and passwords so that you can go back later and remove the listing once the house sells.
3. Design a professional looking flyer and put out for sale by owner signs and a flyer box. If you aren't the artistic type and don't know that much about designing things like flyers consider a site like vflyer which will give you templates for designing a flyer. Take some good pictures of the house with your digital camera and put them on the flyer. If you use Vflyer or a program like it you can probably use the same template to post the house to craigslist and ebay (if you decide to pay for a listing).
4. Be creative. When we put our house on the market we ordered an eight foot full color printed banner to put on our fence. Our house backed to a major street and we were able to get some major exposure from the banner. I have heard of people offering free vacations, big screen tvs, cash bonus' to the listing agent and even a free car. I have also heard of people giving away a cool prize at their open house. These things can help get your house noticed which is the first step to getting it sold.
5. Make sure that your price is competitive. Consider using the money that you are saving on real estate commissions to cut the price of your house so that it is more competitive. In tough markets it is going to be very important that your house isn't priced too high or people will find another option. In our area there were a ton of houses on the market and most of the houses that were selling were 5% or more undervalued. If that is what it takes you might need to swallow hard and cut the price of your house.
Of course all of these things are just suggestions. Still, when things get tough and you need to sell your house these could be an option for you. They worked for us.
- Related Videos
- Related Articles
- Ask / Related Q&A
- Top 3 Real Estate Selling Mistakes
- Denver Co Real Estate – Selling your Home Faster During a Housing Slump
- Minneapolis Real Estate -- Selling your home during the recession
- Dallas Real Estate Selling Tips
- Real Estate Selling - Top Tips
- The Residential Real Estate Selling Process in Austin Texas
- Real Estate: Sell Your House
- 5 Proven Real Estate Tips to Succeeding at Fixer Uppers
You Have To Find A Way To Make Extra Income But Don't Have A Lot Of Time Available!
By: Father Time | 10/07/2009A few suggestions to consider about earning extra income in your spare time by selling "something" that is easy to sell, and that folks will buy on "impulse!"
Types of Home Shopping Products
By: ATV | 09/07/2009Ever wonder just what type of products you can find when shopping from the comfort of your own home? The answer might surprise you. You can find just about anything that will make your life a little bit easier and make home life just a little more efficient.
How to Maximize your Business Using Customer Stories
By: Curtis Hannah | 08/07/2009The key to successfully integrating customer testimonials into your marketing message is honesty. Using unedited, genuine stories from real customers is a great way to get your message out. Altered or 'planted' stories will almost always come off as phony and will cause a great deal more harm than good.
Police community information touchscreen kiosks
By: Sequoia Technology Ltd | 08/07/2009Kiosks4business have developed a police community information kiosk for multichannel two-way information delivery to local residents.
Consult, Don't Sell
By: Aaron Hassen | 08/07/2009No one really likes being sold to. What we all want is a trusted consultant who is objective, informative and honest with us when we’re in a position to risk our time and money on a product or service. We buy because there’s a benefit we desire for ourselves from that product or service. We want the best price for the right product or service that meets our need. Each of these is important to remember when you’re on the other side of the equation, in the position of helping the buyer.
Smash Sales Targets with 10 Simple Steps
By: Jenny | 08/07/2009Many companies work very hard to increase sales, but they overlook the small things that ensure customers are happy and buy again. Increase sales in just 10 steps.
Lankafood Adds Free Services for Sri Lankan Expatriates
By: simon | 08/07/2009Flowermound, April 1 /PRNewswire – Lankafood.com LLC, the pioneer in gift delivery services to Sri Lanka, has added several free services to its website, making it the virtual “home away from home” for Sri Lankan expatriates. The services include letter mailing, online music, and traditional Sri Lankan recipes.
Yarn And Knitting Yarn
By: Hazar Umutay | 08/07/2009The word “yarn” is defined in dictionaries as “Continuous strand of twisted threads of natural or synthetic material, used in weaving or knitting.” This is the basic information for yarn, and includes many points for the categorization of yarn.
What to Do If Your Text Doesn't Fit With the Fastback PowisPrinter
By: Jeff McRitchie | 19/05/2009 | PresentationIf your text is too long or too tall for the strip, the printer won't print your strip. Once you press PRINT, the printer will advise you of this. This message - which tells you what to do - flashes very quickly, and then returns to the Text Screen. If you miss it, you can try one of the three options listed below. However, sometimes you will need to try several of these options to make your text fit and appear properly on your strip. The more strip printing and design that you do the easier th
Using the Repeat Button With the Powis Parker Fastback PowisPrinter
By: Jeff McRitchie | 19/05/2009 | PresentationWhen using the PowisPrinter software for your Powis Parker Fastback Powisprinter the repeat button allows you to title and bind a series of the same-thickness books. For example, if you have twenty copies of a manual to title and bind, use REPEAT. It makes the binding job lots easier, and is quick, quick, quick. Keep in mind that the REPEAT button is for multiple print-and-bind jobs only. If you want to print and bind a single document, use PRINT & BIND; if you want to print many strips of the
Using the Print Window of the PowisPrint Software For the Fastback PowisPrinter
By: Jeff McRitchie | 19/05/2009 | SoftwareWhen you select "Print" from the file menu, the Print Window opens. The Print Window display is divided into five buttons (the Print Commands) and four boxes (the Status Boxes). This article will provide an overview of the different buttons and boxes that are part of this Print Window. Understanding these boxes is essential for getting the results that you need when you print your Fastback binding strips.
Using the Powis Parker Fastback 9 - Choosing a Binding Mode
By: Jeff McRitchie | 19/05/2009 | PresentationThis article is designed to introduce you to the eight different modes offered by the Fastback 9 binding machine. You can change the mode on your machine by simply pressing the menu button repeatedly until the mode that you are looking for appears on the LCD display.
Using the More Options Menu on Your Fastback 15xs Binding Machine
By: Jeff McRitchie | 19/05/2009 | PresentationOn your Fastback 15xs binding machine the MORE OPTIONS menu allows you to customize various binding settings that can be important for certain applications. To enter this menu, you simply need to choose "MORE OPTIONS" from the special functions menu on your Fastback machine. Once you are here there are seven different options available to you. This article will describe these seven different options and what they are used for.
Using the FoilFast P21x Printer to Print on Clear Covers Using a Mac
By: Jeff McRitchie | 19/05/2009 | PresentationUsing the Powis Parker Fastback P21x FoilFast printer it is possible to print high quality images on clear covers with either metallic or matte colored foils. This article is designed to provide instructions for printing in a single foil color and in multiple foil colors using a Macintosh computer and the P21x Foilfast printer. When you print on a clear cover with the FoilFast printer you will need to make sure that your printer is loaded with the colors of foil that you intend on using as well
Using the Fastback S41 Edge Splitter and Setting the Paper Stop
By: Jeff McRitchie | 19/05/2009 | PresentationThe Powis Parker Fastback S41 edge splitter is a unique device that is designed to quickly and easily prepare documents printed on hard-to-bind papers for thermal adhesive binding. The machine is actually quite easy to use. However, it never hurts to have instructions. This article will provide step by step instructions for using the Fastback edge splitter and for adjusting the paper stop (an important aspect to the S41's operation).
Using the Fastback PowisPrinter P31 Spine Printer
By: Jeff McRitchie | 19/05/2009 | PresentationThe Fastback PowisPrinter is an extraordinary new printer that lets you print directly onto a Powis Parker binding strip. It prints colored text on up to three different locations of the strip, in a variety of orientations, and accepts different lengths of narrow, medium and wide Binderstrips. So not only can you print on Binderstrips, but you have complete flexibility in how you do it.