Sell Your House Yourself

Save Thousands of dollars

Why You Don’t Need the MLS To Sell Your House

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The multiple listing service, or MLS, is the place where real estate brokerages cooperate and put their houses that they’re selling so they’re all in one place. That’s where the brokerages agents go to list the houses that they’re selling or to look for homes for the buyers that they’re representing. But do you need the MLS if your selling your house?

The short answer is no. You don’t need the MLS.

In this post I’m going to talk about the more complicated answer. Why you don’t need the MLS to sell your house and different ways you can use the MLS if you do feel it’s necessary.

Full disclosure:  I am a real estate agent in the state of Kansas and have been since two since 2009. I do use the MLS to put the homes that I’m selling on. I’m also not currently selling my house myself. When it is time to sell my house I will not post it on the MLS because I don’t want to pay a buyers real estate agent.

The houses for sale that I see on the MLS, you can actually see on 3rd party real estate websites like Zillow, Realtor.com and agent corporate websites. Home buyers have the same access to viewing real estate listings as I do.

The difference between realtor.com, the agent websites and Zillow, is Zillow will post for sale by owners while the other two will not. So buyers have more homes for sale to choose from when browsing Zillow. In all honesty you will get more exposure putting your house on the MLS because it will syndicate out to Realtor.com and the agent websites.

Why Use Zillow?

Zillow.com is the most popular and widely used real estate website. They get about 36 million visitors a month. 36 million! That’s a lot of eyes.

As mentioned you won’t get as much exposure on Zillow alone simply because the mls distributes your listing to more websites. Keep in mind though Zillow is the most popular place where home buyers search for homes. Zillow is a huge multi-billion dollar company that incorporates other businesses under it’s umbrella. They have a mortgage business, a showing service and an Ibuyer department. Zillow will buy your house directly from you. Zillow an all encompassing one stop shop real estate public company.

Most of my clients end up finding their home themselves on Zillow and simply forward that information to me. Then I set up showings for them through the sellers’ agent. Granted the agents will take care of paperwork for you but at what cost? That transaction could easily have happened without real estate agents in the middle.

Zillow.com will let you list your house on there popular website for free as a for sale by owner. I’ll show you how to do that right here. That is the cheapest way to sell your house where you’ll find the biggest return. You’ll get to keep the most of your money that way.

MLS Options

If you feel like you have to put your house on the MLS, you can hire me or another real estate agent. There’s literally millions of us around the country and we’ll charge you anywhere from 4% to 7% of the contract price to put your house on the MLS. We only get paid if it sells but what a nice paycheck it is.

Housing prices have risen dramatically in the past year. It’s going to cost you a bundle more than it would have just a year ago. It’s really expensive to list your house with an agent, but it’s more than likely that it will sell a little quicker than if you sell it on your own.

A realtor will do just about everything for you. They’ll help you to price your house. A real agent will let you know what you need to do to get your home ready for market (and then you have to do it). Sometimes staging is a benefit and your realtor will get that done for you. The most useful thing a real estate agent does is to guide you through the process and everything involved in such. Everything from choosing an offer once your house is on the market to getting that contract to the closing table.

The other option to get your house on the MLS is to use a flat fee MLS service. These are companies that will list your house for a fraction of the cost that a real estate agent charges. If you use a flat fee service you get that extra exposure for a lot less money. By using a flat fee service you generally have to do all the work an agent does yourself. You’ll have to learn to price your house and how to get it ready for market.

You Choose The Method and The Returns

You can list your house on the MLS by paying me or paying a flat fee service. If that doesn’t appeal to your financial sense of well being list your house for free on Zillow. Sell it yourself saving those real estate commissions.

You Choose.

When Will The Housing Inventory Crisis End?

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neighborhood of residential homes depicting the housing inventory crisis
Housing Inventory Crisis

If you’ve been thinking about selling a house or if you’ve been in the market to buy a house or if you’ve been paying any attention at all to the real estate market, you’ve probably noticed the housing inventory crisis that we’re in. Inventory is desperately needed to cool this overheated market. Now, to be sure, a market like this is great for sellers, but not so good for buyers. It’s very uneven.

So, here we’re going to get some insight into how long this inventory crisis may last. You’ll find out what it means to you as a for sale by owner and when might be a good time for you to cash in on your equity.

For the video version of what’s happening with the housing inventory crisis check it out on my YouTube channel, Sell Your House Yourself.

Inventory Crisis

These inventory problems have been building for several years. Back in 2016, while the country was still pulling out of the 2008/2009 financial crisis, the housing market was getting back to its pre-recession levels. In 2018, a short 2 years later, as Realtors we started noticing there were less houses for sale. That continued getting worse until 2020 and into 2021 when inventory just became non-existent and that caused prices to go vertical. Housing prices have gone up 18% year over year according to some estimates.

Graph showing the housing market since 2000, the 2008/2009 financial crisis recovery and the rapid rise in real estate prices the last year.

What’s Happening Now?

But what’s happening right now with the inventory crisis? The good news for the health of the market in general is it seems to be easing, as you can see from this graph.

Graph showing housing inventory trends since January 2018 and how they have been in crisis lately.

Zillow said back in their April report that;

Signs are emerging that the nations’ ongoing inventory squeeze may be starting to ease somewhat. Just in time for the traditional busy Spring home shopping season.

Zillow April report

In April and June, the housing inventory crisis was still pretty bad. New listings were getting multiple offers, many well over asking price. In some places like California numbers like $75,000 over. And even more. Buyers were offering to forego inspection contingencies. Buyers were making up the difference in appraised value to contract price in cash.  It was crazy. There are still some hotspots around the country like Southern California, Seattle, Denver and some cities on the east coast but overall it seems to be easing…a little. In July, we have started to notice more houses coming on the market and less buyers.

The buyers, I think, are going away because they’re getting priced out of the market or they’re just throwing up their hands in despair and giving up. Many sellers are cashing in and turning to renting for awhile. That’s putting housing inventory on the market.   Zillow says there are 32% more listings this June than there were last June. So we’re starting to see the market start to even out some. Without a doubt it still has a ways to go, but inventory is getting better.

The Inventory Crisis Wildcard

The wild card is going to be the mortgage forbearance program that was part of the Cares Act passed by Congress to deal with the Covid pandemic. Mortgage forbearance prevented homeowners that missed mortgage payments to be foreclosed on. Those that fell on hard times would not lose their house.

That was supposed to end June 30th. It was extended to July 30 and the request period to September 30th. The president is asking Congress to extend it again. Once that goes away, there’s a lot of people that are predicting a great big market crash. You can see all these market crash videos on YouTube. They’ve been coming out in force since 2017 then again in 2018, 2019, 2020 and even into this year predicting a housing market crash, the housing market crash. Well, eventually they’re going to be right, but I don’t think it’s going to be in 2021 or 2022.

Chart showing Mortgage forbearance timelines

The reason being, once the mortgage moratorium ends, there won’t be a huge amount of foreclosures 2009 recession style. A lot of people have gotten back to work now. The economy is improving and in good shape.  Most people using the program are going to be able to pick up where they left off with their house payments. In most cases the missed payments will get tacked on to the end of their loan to be paid back when the house sells or is paid off.

Hopefully we’ll get some inventory out of the end of forbearance. No one wish’s anything bad on homeowners. We don’t want anybody to get foreclosed on, but there are going to be some people that are going to have some trouble.  The housing market will more than likely see some foreclosures, which may bring the inventory levels up a little, help stabilize the market and ease the housing inventory crisis the country is currently experiencing.

What Should You Do Now?

So, if you’re thinking about or have thought about cashing in on the equity in your house now is a good time. If you do plan on selling to cash in on all that equity from these rapidly rising prices, make sure you have a plan.  If your plan is to sell your house and then buy another house you may just be spinning your wheels.

Remember, it’s a great time for sellers, not so great for buyers. All that profit you make on your house will get eaten up with real estate commissions and the expensive house you buy. That’s OK if that’s your plan, just be aware.

I know there have been a lot of people that have sold their house because they just couldn’t turn down all that money from their equity. Many of those as aforementioned are renting now. But, rent prices have soared lately. Make sure you check rent prices in the area you want to live. If you do decide to rent keep in mind this housing inventory crisis won’t last forever.

Chart showing the dramatic uptick in rent prices

Right now your almost guaranteed a good, if not fantastic, price for your house because we are in such a strong sellers’ market. If you’re not quite ready to sell you probably still have some time.

What’s Next For Housing

Analysts are expecting home prices to rise 6% to 8% into the end of 2021 and into 2022. It doesn’t look like there will be any big changes in the next year or two. So you still have some time according to the nation’s economists. While we have a pretty dramatic housing inventory crisis right now it does seem to be improving slowly. Nobody realistically expects the bottom to fall out anytime soon.

This is not a bubble. What it is, is a simple case of supply and demand. Not enough supply. Too much demand. That is what caused this housing inventory crisis.

Make/Save Even More Money

Whatever selling decisions you decide on, make sure you sell your house yourself to avoid those expensive real estate commissions. I’ll show you how to sell your home fast and for the most money.

Why Real Estate Agents Are So Expensive?

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Happy real estate agent about to get paid.
Expensive real estate agent about to get paid

You have to wonder why real estate agents are so expensive. Why it cost you so much money when you hire one to sell your house. Why do people still hire real estate agents to sell a house when there are so many other less expensive ways. The real estate industry says it’s relationships. Many people don’t realize there are options. Some sellers just don’t want to deal with the “hassle”.

Let’s take a look at why real estate agents are so expensive.

Listing Agent

First let’s break down what an agent does on the listing side, that is, when they sell your house for you. A listing agent.

  • A real estate agent helps you determine the right price for your house. The most important factor in selling your house. If a house doesn’t sell it’s overpriced and everything is relative to price including location, condition and features.
  • An agent will most of the time show you what can be done to your home to get it ready for market. Good agents will wait until your home is ready before they list it. Desperate agents want to get a sign in the yard ASAP because they need money. Hire a good agent. Get more money.
  • When a house is ready the listing agent puts it on the market. The agent lists the house in the multiple listing service. This is where other real estate agents can see it. That also means putting the property on the internet where everyone else can see it. Smart agents feature your property on sites like Zillow and Trulia which you can easily do yourself.
  • When you get an offer on your house the agent is there to act as the middleman. They’ll pass information back and forth between you and your buyer or what they call “negotiating”. Having an agent to help you negotiate is handy. Especially if you don’t want to meet your buyer or talk to them directly…for whatever reason.
  • Where agents are most useful is facilitating all of the transnational details such as inspections, appraisals and paperwork.
  • At closing your agent will sometimes give you a cheap gift to show their appreciation for all the money you just gave them.

The advice new agents always get is to concentrate on being a “listing agent”. Being a listing agent involves a lot less actual work than a buyers, or selling, agent. The listing agent has a 1-2 hour meeting with a client then puts the house on the market and waits for an offer.

Selling Agent

The selling agent, often referred to as the buyers agent, helps buyers find a home. Let’s go over what a buyers agent does.

  • The buyers agent helps a buyer find a home. Considering most buyers find their home themselves online buyers agents mostly just open doors. Sometimes that can be a lot of doors. The average buyer looks at 10 homes according to realtor.com. Sometimes it’s less and sometimes it’s considerably more.
  • When a buyer finds a home the agent helps formulate an offer. By looking at past sales the agent can determine fair value. An offer takes into consideration the condition of the property and any updating that’s been done to the house..
  • The buyers agent submits the offer. The sellers agent then shows the offer to their client.
  • When the offer finally gets accepted the agent then guides the client through the remainder of the process. That includes any inspections the buyer wants to do. There are transactional details and paperwork on the buyers side too.

Where Does All The Money Go?

Expense to sell a house

The money or commission in a real estate transaction all goes to the listing agents broker. The listing broker then pays the listing agent and the selling agents broker who then pays the selling agent. You are actually paying for your buyers agent. It would be like paying for your opponents lawyer in court. It’s done this way because this is the way it’s always been done. A buyer would likely not pay for an agent on their own.

But it’s not just the real estate brokerages and their agents anymore.

With the internet a crop of entrepreneurs have sprung that have figured out a way to put themselves between the broker/agent and the client. They do this by running ads on the internet offering real estate services. When a consumer responds to an ad the company puts them in touch with an agent. That agent then gets charged a referral fee of 25% – 40% of the commission.

So that’s a middle man to the middleman and yet another expense.

It’s not just the middlemen either. Competition in real estate is fierce. For instance in my area of close to 600,000 inhabitants there are about 2500 real estate agents and only 1800 homes for sale. All those agents have to hunt up business. There are a multitude of companies, some reputable but not many, that offer real estate agents easy ways to get business…for a substantial fee.

As I can attest to real estate association fees have risen dramatically over the past several years. Association fees are paid at the local level, the state level and the national level.

Real estate is a huge business with a lot of hands being held out that need to be paid.

That’s one reason why real estate agents are so expensive. While the job of selling real estate may have become easier the money involved is spread around more than ever. Many people and organizations want, and get, a piece of that action.

Selling Real Estate Got Easier

A long time ago, in an age before the internet, if you wanted to sell or buy a house you had to have a real estate agent. The real estate industry owned all the information about the housing markets. They held it close. These days all that valuable information is online, free and available to all.

Marketing a home was not so easy. Homes for sale were put in books the real estate brokerages owned. Consumers had to hire an agent in order to see those books full of listings. If you wanted to see a house you needed an agent to set up a showing for you.

Now an agent sells homes through the internet. A house is listed on sites like Zillow and home shoppers find them. many of the online real estate portals don’t charge anything to advertise a house. List it and forget it until an offer comes in.

There was a time whenever a signature was needed the agent and client had to meet together. get in a car and drive to a meeting place. it was time consuming. Companies like docusign and authentisign have put a stop to all that driving around. Now signatures can be obtained never leaving your desk. Another way agents save a lot of time.

Everything that an agent does has become easier and less time consuming.

So why are real estate agents so expensive? It seems they have less work to do with all the technology available now. Consumers are finding homes themselves online. Information is free. Listing a home is incredibly easy when compared to 30 years ago.

Real estate agents are still able to make so much money because people are willing to pay it. When people think about selling a house the first thing they think of is hiring an agent. it’s just natural. The $18,000 fee to sell a $300,000 house doesn’t, in most cases, even raise an eyebrow.

Sell Your House Yourself

When more home sellers start figuring how easy it really is to sell a house the real estate industry will have to take notice and start making some changes. Fees will have to become more realistic if brokers want to stay in business.

Until that time home sellers will continue to pay agents a good portion of their profits and agents will continue to take it.

Except the savvy home sellers who figure out how to do it on their own.

What To Do When Your Buyer Has A Real Estate Agent

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What do you do with your For Sale By Owner when the buyer has a real estate agent they want to work with? You actually have a multitude of choices. Remember, you are in control. That’s one of the reasons you decided to do a For Sale By Owner.

You can:

  1. Pay the agent his or her rate..
  2. Tell them thank you but no thank you you will wait for a buyer without an agent.
  3. Negotiate with the buyers agent.
  4. Separate the buyer from the agent.
Buyers agent shaking hands with their client outside of a house.
When your buyer has a real estate agent

Let’s go through these options one at a time. Keep in mind that the reason you’re selling your home yourself is to save money. Lots of money. Depending on your personality, time constraints and stubbornness will determine what’s in your best interest when your buyer has an agent.

Pay The Agent His or Her Rate

When your buyer has a real estate agent you can pay the agent his or her rate. In my state, Kansas, that is most likely 3% of the contract price. Otherwise it would be 6% if you were hiring a listing agent. The bonus to this option is the agent will do all the paperwork for you. You still save thousands of dollars on the listing side.

The agent will want to use their contracts so make sure you read and understand what it is you’re signing. Real estate contracts from real estate associations are designed to protect the real estate brokerage and absolve them from responsibility.

Beware the agent that tries and charge more or even double saying they have to “do all the work”. In my experience it is much easier to handle a real estate transaction when I don’t have to deal with another agent. When I handle the hole thing myself. In reality there’s really no more “work” involved for the buyers agent. Don’t let them fool you into thinking there is no matter how slick they talk.

Wait For Another Buyer

Tell them thank you but no thank you. This is exactly what it appears to be. You’re just not going to pay a real estate agent. In this case the potential buyer missed out on a great house because they hired a buyers agent.

There’s this thing in real estate called Agency. When a buyer is in an agency agreement it is their responsibility to pay the agent if you, the seller, doesn’t. At least in Kansas and most other states that’s how it works. The right thing to do for the agent would be to walk away and go find another client. Most of the time the real estate agent had nothing to do with the buyer finding your For Sale By Owner anyway.

Again, if you have prepared your home for market as we show you how to do and priced it right you will get lots of attention. So much that a buyer may be willing to pay their agent to get your house. So much that a buyer may be willing to fight to dump the agent to get your house.

I have been in this exact situation at times with a For Sale By Owner and simply walked away so my client could get their home. With a lot of these clients we still remain friends to this day and they send me referrals too!

If that makes me sound holier than thou I’m not. I’ve just always lived by the philosophy if you treat people right and fair you will get treated the same.

Negotiate When Buyer Has a Real Estate Agent

There is nothing that says you can’t negotiate with your buyers agent. Tell them you want to sell your house on your own but you’ll think about offering them 1.5% of the contract price. Or 2% or whatever you want to offer. They can see what a good job you’ve done getting ready, and that you won’t have any problem getting your home sold. Plus, once again, you can get the agent to do the work for you.

If you are going to negotiate do so with the buyer present. The agent will try and negotiate without the buyers knowledge, even though eventually he/she has to disclose it. They don’t want their client to know they aren’t getting their dream home because the agent isn’t willing to budge.

Separate the Buyer From the Agent

When your buyer has an agent try and separate the buyer from the agent. This is a little tricky and unless all the stars align might not even be possible. If there is way to have a conversation with your buyer without the agent present you may be able to work something out.

For instance in the past I have had people call me, from referrals, and ask me to help them find a house because they did not like their agent. Ethically I can’t do anything but advise them that if they don’t like their agent they need to break the contract, agency, that they have with that agent. Start by talking to the agent directly. If that doesn’t work talk to the agents broker. Ultimately If that still produces no desirable results call the real estate commision in your state and complain.

You can pass on that advice. If your home is as spectacular as it should be and your buyer has a real estate agent you can probably get them to drop the agent.

Sell Your Home Yourself

The real estate industry is in a great flux and changing rapidly. People are starting to figure out that real estate brokerages are expensive and just not that necessary anymore. Instead of being the caretakers of information, which is all publicly available now, they are switching to a service standard. We call it representation. A real estate agent simply represents.

If you need representation and you don’t have the time or inclination to sell your home yourself than hire an agent. I pay someone to mow my lawn because my time is worth more than if I were spending it mowing.

By following our detailed instruction we can show you how to sell your home yourself for the most money while at the same time saving thousands of dollars. It’s the thing agents should be doing for you to get top dollar and to often don’t.

8 Tips To Always Be Ready to Show Your House FSBO

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Ready to show

When you have your house on the market for sale it is important the house is always ready to show. You never know when that full price cash offer is going to request a showing. When they do you certainly want to be ready.

I always tell my listing clients that you never, ever, ever want to deny a showing. The person who is destined to buy your house may buy another on the same day access to yours was denied. That’s not to say the home won’t eventually sell but you could be losing out on a better offer. Point is you just never know.

When I’m scheduling showings as a buyers agent and a showing request is denied it is so very annoying, to me and my client. Sometimes I hear things like “the house is a mess” or “it’s just not a good time”. My buyer’s reaction usually is “they must not really want to sell their house”.

Although it’s not always easy it’s always a good idea to be ready to show!

Great curb appeal and ready to show

Assuming you have already done all the work to get your home on the market there are some daily habits and hacks you can preform to make sure it’s always ready to show.

1) Develop new habits

Make it a habit to pick up as you go. If you’re anything like me you probably have routines. Routines like coming home from work or wherever and putting your stuff somewhere. Get in the habit of putting your “stuff”, like papers, receipts, extra pens, pocket change ect in a drawer or somewhere else out of sight.

When you use a dish in the kitchen immediately put in the dishwasher, providing you have a dishwasher. If not, wash it right away. If your reading a book, put it back in the bookshelf when done for the day. Simple things like that will make keeping the house show ready easy.

2) Keep it clean

When selling your home, and selling it for the top dollar and fast, it pays, literally, to always be ready to show. Keeping your house clean can make all the difference. It’s not always easy but it is profitable.

Run the vacuum every night, or have someone in the family do it. Wipe down and/or dust visible surfaces. Basically clean the house every night before turning in. This is not as difficult as it seems if you assign duties to family members and get into a routine. Get everyone excited about the move and make a game out it. It doesn’t have to be stressful.

It’s really not “cleaning” every night, like a deep clean. That’s already been done. This is more of a “straightening up” every evening. It won’t take long.

Keep it clean and ready to show

3) Use storage

Make your life easier during the home sale by getting rid of anything that is not day to day necessary. Many of my clients hire a storage facility or mobile storage unit like PODs to clear all the clutter out of the house. (Not that all your stuff is clutter but you know what I mean)

By having less stuff in the house it shows better and is easier to keep clean, organized and straight.

4) Stash your stuff

Stash your stuff. What I mean by stash your stuff is have places you can put things during showings or when you’re not going to be home. That can be drawers, cabinets, under furniture (yes, seriously) or neatly in a closet.

One of my clients had 6 younger foster children. With lots of toys. We really had a situation trying to figure out to keep the house picked up. As a solution I purchased several nice looking plastic storage totes from amazon. She kept them in different rooms the kids frequented. The kids were trained to pick up all the toys when finished playing and put them in the totes. Every time before they could leave the house for a showing or to go out the kids had to pick up their stuff and put it in the bins. It worked marvelously. They made a game of it.

5) No trash

Have literally no trash in your house. This can go back to developing habits and this one is emptying the trash every morning. Keep whatever you use to line your trash cans close by and simply gather up all the trash, take it outside and insert new fresh liners.

When people are looking at your home they open cabinets, it just happens. If that’s where you keep your refuse receptor they are going to see it. Having an empty trash can is much more appealing then a bag full of stinky ugly trash. Believe or not I’ve seen people open trash cans, decorative stand alone trashcans with lids. Weird? Yes, but it too happens.

6) Get some magic cleaners

There are all sorts of products on the market that make cleaning walls and surfaces fast, easy and convenient. For cleaning smudges, handprints and some writings a “magic sponge” does the trick. There are many different brands and types to choose from. Microfiber cloths are great for picking up dust, lint and pet dander off surfaces.

Keeping items like these handy can make straightening up and “quick cleans” easy, fast and profitable.

7) Avoid odors

While your house is on the market avoid any cooking that produces strong odors. Your cooking probably smells really good and I bet I would like it too but…not everyone has the same tastes as we do. What smells good to me and you may not to others, like that full price cash buyer.

You’ll also hear lots of advice about fresh baking, scentsy’s and other “good” smells. Don’t believe them. What is a good smell to one person may offend another. Plain neutral fresh air is the best.

8) Take a vacation

Just kidding, but maybe not. If you can swing it the least stressful option is to not be home at all. Prepare the house as per DIY Real Estate instructions and take off for a few weeks.

When selling your house yourself, and saving thousands of dollars, it’s not always realistic to take off. It’s still possible though if you could leave someone behind, like a family member. Maybe you have a good friend or neighbor willing to help with showings.

I have actually seen that happen before in my role as a real estate agent showing a buyer a FSBO home. The client wanted to see a For Sale By Owner house. When I called the owner to schedule he told me he was out of town. He gave us a number for a neighbor who let us in.

Ready for market, ready to show

As you can see keeping your home show ready is possible and can be made to be not all that difficult. If all the hard work of preparing your house for market is done properly beforehand the touch ups for showings should be easy.

Keep in mind the rewards for all your hard work. You get to keep thousands of dollars you would have been paying me, or someone like me. And remember that you end up doing all the hard work of preparing your house for market and keeping it show ready anyway, whether you have an agent or not. No one does that for you so think about what it is you’re actually paying for.

I will show you in detail everything you need to know to have a successful For Sale By Owner. Literally everything a real estate agent should be doing and you can do better to sell your house fast and for the most money.

Click here to learn more about how to sell your house yourself and save thousands of dollars.