For Sale By Owner (FSBO) – Weighing the Good and Bad

If you have just listed your house FSBO, I know what you are thinking…”I can save $10,000 in commission if I sell it myself”, “I am in no hurry to sell” or “Realtors are like used car salesman…sleazy.” Okay, I get it. You don’t trust Realtors. I mean, all they do is find you a house so why should you pay so much in commission. I used to think the same way. Guess what folks, there is a reason and the majority of us (Realtors) probably do have your best interest at heart, BUT YOU PICK US! If you decide to do an entry only listing on the MLS because you got a special flat rate deal of $400 for MLS exposure without signing a listing agreement with a Realtor than you choose your own destiny. You are receiving exactly what you paid for “limited service.”

Keller Williams doesn’t allow us to provide limited entry service to customers. Why? I mean, if we are all so slick shouldn’t we take the buck where we can get it? Ummmm, NO!! At Keller Williams, we believe in customer service and we work for our clients by pricing their homes to sell. We don’t overprice and we don’t under-price. We do the research to find their RIGHT price… I can truly only speak for myself but I am proud to be a part of such a wonderful company with such high standards and ethics.

That being said, I pay hundreds of dollars every year to remain in the most visible and current home searching pool available, the OKC MLS. I have to go through an OSBI and FBI background check to become a Realtor and I participate in hours and hours of educational classes to remain current on real estate, marketing and financing trends that effect my transactions….to the tune of 5+ hours a week. Let me ask you, as a For Sale By Owner, are you investing this much time in to Real Estate?

I didn’t think so….and I surely wouldn’t expect so. If you were, you would have probably found out by now that, statistically, only about 1-3% of FSBO’s actually sell their homes themselves and when they do, they average 88-90 cents on the dollar. I think the current average sales prices is around 97% of listing price so that is what I will base this scenario on.

To break that down:

Difference of $6,180 in your favor that a Realtor could have gotten you and it probably took way less time to sell and what did you have to do to earn that extra six thousand dollars? NADA! Okay, you still had to keep your house clean but you were doing that already.

So you are still not convinced? When you list your property….where will you go? Craig’s List is great if you can stay toward the top of the listings. So is any other site you are able to make the listing visible but are you dedicated to updating it a minimum of weekly or as information changes? Are you receiving exposure on over 25 websites by tens of thousands of folks within a few minutes of listing it? I am!

Many Realtors won’t even tell their clients about For Sale By Owners available out there if they happen upon them because the FSBO’s are often uneducated when it comes to the everchanging Real Estate and Financial markets and unable to complete their side of the transaction legally and without complications on their own. They don’t have easy access to the contracts and required disclosures. In addition, they typically don’t want to pay a commission to the buyer’s agent and end up creating twice the work for said agent so it places the buyer’s agent in a tough spot…like if I came in to your office, hung out and took up all of your time for a week straight that you didn’t get paid for…..not really fair is it?

My approach to FSBOs is a bit unorthodox. If you fit the need of one of my buyers, I WILL contact you but I will make sure up front that if I bring you a buyer you are going to compensate me. That is only fair. I will probably even give you pointers and tips on how to market your property and stage you home while I am there because…..well, that is what I do! I enjoy helping people and making them happy. And we ARE all after the same goal of selling homes and making people happy.

My final advice is this: If you are tirelessly dedicated to selling yourself, try it for three weeks. Give it your best shot. If at the end of the three weeks you house is not under contract, don’t get discouraged, just pick up your phone and call me.