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Real Estate Hot Tips

10 Steps You Must Take Before You Sell Your Home

Essential Home Selling Preparations

1. Get Pre-Approved for a Home Loan

Before you decide to sell the house, get pre-approved by a lender you trust and research the housing market in the area where you wish to live so that you have a good idea how much it will take to buy a replacement.

2. Check Your Mortgage Payoff

Call your lender to check the payoff for your current home mortgage. This will help you understand how much money YOU will receive when you sell your home.

3. Determine How Much the House Is Worth in Your Marketplace

• Determine your home's fair market value. Real estate agents will usually help you determine value as a courtesy. You can also order an appraisal which is a more thorough analysis of your home's value. However an appraisal can cost you several hundred dollars.

4. Estimate Your Costs to Sell

• Costs will include real estate commission if you use an agency to sell, attorney, closing agent and other professional fees, excise tax for the sale, prorated costs for your share of annual expenses, such as property taxes, home owner association fees, and fuel tank rentals.
   
• Real estate agents deal with transactions every day and can give you a very close estimate of seller closing costs.

5. Determine Your Costs to Acquire a New Home

• Total your costs to acquire a new home: moving expenses, loan costs, down payment, home inspections, title work and policy, paying for a new hazard insurance policy--all expenses related to buying a home. Your lender should give you a disclosure of estimated costs when you apply for pre-approval.

6. Calculate Your Estimated Proceeds

• Deduct your mortgage payoff from your home's fair market value.
• Deduct your costs to sell from the remainder to get an estimate of the proceeds you will be paid at closing.

7. Make Necessary Repairs

Make all needed repairs unless you want the house to be regarded as a fixer-upper. I'm not referring to cosmetic updates, but to items in need of repair. Anything that's obviously broken gives potential buyers a reason to submit a lower offer.

8. Get the House Ready to Show

Most houses need at least a little attention before they are shown to potential buyers. The ability to "stage a home" can reward you with a substantially higher sales price.

9. Prepare to Cooperate to Show Your Home

You're real estate agent will no doubt ask you to leave when the house is shown. This is because lurking sellers make buyers nervous and they don't feel comfortable inspecting the house when they feel they are intruding.

Unless there's a real reason for it, don't ask your agent to be present for all showings. That's the kiss of death for showing activity. Other agents want privacy with their buyers and they don't usually have time to work around your agent's schedule.

Make the house accessible. That means it's always ready to show. Many agents won't bother showing a house that takes 24 hours to get into.

10. If you're ready to sell, contact the professionals at MyTwinCitiesHome.com. We can help you with professional service!

At My Twin Cities Home we strive to provide the best possible service and pricing combinations so you benefit from having excellent representation throughout the purchase or sale of your home and you benefit by keeping more of your money so you can take advantage of doing some good financial planning.