How to sell a home via an IM instead of Realtor

by EMuu
24 replies
Hello,

I consider myself a relative beginner IM and looking for opinions on a personal project. My parents business has been slowly fading due to circumstances outside of their hands but they are very handy and active with real estate.

About a year ago they bought a house for a steal and poured tons of time and energy into it and are finally ready to sell it in the hopes of supplementing some income. They have sold homes in the past through a realtor but you essentially lose 3% of your profits this way and are attempting to sell it themselves which would increase their profits about 5k.

I offered my help to sell it. Here is what I am thinking.... take photos and video tutorial of the home and edit them and make a Wordpress site with a photography theme (to display all the photos etc). I have a $50 adword I can cash in on and will target very specific keywords to the area they are selling. On top of that I will put it on Craigslist and other free forums.

Does anyone have any suggestions on ways to help them sell the home. I would really appreciate any help especially since it is just to help my parents who did so much for me growing up. Thanks!
#home #realtor #sell
  • Profile picture of the author sevaans
    Set up a website and list it as a local business in the area with google directories?
    Set up a Web 2.0 account profile with it as the blurb?

    Find out some local niche real estate keywords that people are searching for in the area?

    Good luck!
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  • Profile picture of the author travlinguy
    I think you have most of it figured out. You might consider getting a dedicated domain and just plaster it with pics and videos as well as written descriptions of all the work and upgrades recently done. Then go with Craigs List and eBay classifieds as they both have regional and local listings available for free.

    Then do a search for free classified ads because there are many excellent sites offering similar services as CL and eBay. Get as many ads as you can on every free site out there. Most of them have listings for major cities around the US. Hopefully you're near one of them.

    Then be sure to get ads in all the nickel and penny classified type publications in your area even if it costs a few bucks. Every ad should have the URL for your site with the pics and videos. And don't forget supermarket bulletin boards too. Good luck.
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  • Profile picture of the author Thomas Smale
    Sell it with the professionals. You don't "save" $5k as you'll spend a ton of time doing all this promotion (and that time has a value) and you're not a pro with an established network of buyers.

    I don't sell real estate, but from a business broker perspective, you almost always get MORE value out of a broker than you pay them. You'll get more money, all of their expertise, save time and far less risk.
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  • Profile picture of the author Nickels
    You can use craigslist & youtube ... You can also try putting up your own signs around town (busy intersections and such). I think you may end up putting in too much work to try to sell it yourself - especially if you guys aren't selling the home under market value.
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  • Profile picture of the author J smith
    It isn't as easy as it looks. And most of the "sell it youself" sites are lagging behind and still think it's 2004, where you put a house on a market and it sells within a week for list price or more.

    Anyway, you must list your house in Multiple Listing Service (MLS) otherwise you are hoping to be one of those cases where you were walking your dog, and ran into a neighbor whose brother's friend's dog just won a lottery and was looking to buy a house..

    Once you list the hosue in MLS (some companies offer "entry only" service where all they do is put a home in MLS for a few hundred bucks) it will automaticaly go into many of the real estate sites, which take a feed from MLS (this includes realtor.com zillow.com trulia.com as well as many other sites, local sites and any of the agent's/office's sites)
    Additionally listing in MLS will let all the agents see your house, and most qualified buyers are working with agents now days.

    BTW, even though you are going for sale by owner you better offer the buyer's agent a comission (depends on territory, around here it's usually 2-3%) not offering a buyer's comission pretty much guarantees no agent will ever show your home (so many houses to show, why would they show yours when there are 5 more just like it?)

    A few other reasons for sale by owners tend to run into problems:
    Overpricing a house - owners are usually too attached to their home (especially one they lived in) and feel it's better than the others, and so tend to over price it.
    Can be difficult to show it - how will they handle appointment scheduling/showings?
    Can be perceived as a lot of work by agents - a buyer's agent will look at this as her doing all the work of being dual agent, but only getting paid half comission.

    Don't get me wrong, it can be sold, but statisticaly I think it's about 1 in 10 that actually sell for sale by owner, the rest end up working with an agent.

    Anyway, as far as advertising it goes, get it inot MLS, craig's list is good, youtube is questionable (do you go on youtube and search for 2 bedroom home in town state? most people probably don't) things like personalized domain with virtual tour, qr codes and etc. are all OK provided you can actually get them in front of potential buyers - flyers, signs etc.

    Of course, you have to ask yourself if all of this wil be worth it in the end. You are liable to spend a lot of time and some money, but will you sell your home?
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  • Profile picture of the author TiffanyVee
    J. Smith offers some great advice. I sold real estate for five years (and was consistently in the top of my office). There is A LOT more that goes into selling a home than just marketing it to find a buyer. The paperwork and negotiations alone are worth the price of hiring a professional.
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  • Profile picture of the author tristatemedia
    get a realator and negotiate with them. they are hurting out there. they will negotiate. even if it 1 percent lower. i have been through it before. realator is the way to go.
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    • Profile picture of the author Bill Farnham
      Some real solid advice in this thread.

      You can definitely build a wesite for the property, I've done it. And if you can get a good domain name for the property all the better. Make sure it is a keyword/phrase that has some relevence to the area.

      I also think adding a buyer's agant commision is a good idea. The only area I would differ in is I would make the commission on the high side, say 4% to the buyer agent if they can bring a full price offer.

      If you're going to offer a commission give it some drool factor. Anybody can list a property, the value comes in bringing the buyer, so make the reward worth their time.

      Anecdote time...

      Back in 1998 a good friend of mine wanted to sell his vacation house on the Big Island of Hawaii outside of Hilo. He had a partner, and his partner's wife built a small 5 page website loaded with pictures and good descriptions.

      Some guy in Alaska found the website and bought the house sight unseen.

      Will that happen to you? I have no idea, but you'll never know unless you try.

      Good luck,

      ~Bill
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  • Profile picture of the author successproducts
    It is worth it to give your idea a try. Nothing ventures nothing gains. I'd put a website with house street name as domain???? and do long tail keywords and put up tons of street name youtube videos around your main domain name - well if a buyer wants to buy a house in that area - they will google it maybe for the city name - so maybe using city name and state is a good choice for domain name --

    very very accurate and clear descriptions as well as pictures - so buyers can see exactly what they want to see wherever they are. do not try to hide nothing as it wastes your time as well as theirs.
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  • Profile picture of the author EMuu
    I am always impressed with the feedback on WF... all very helpful. I am along the lines of thinking with "successproducts" post with nothing ventured nothing gained. We have had the house appraised for an odd price range from three different realtors. We heard 159k from two guys and then two others came in at 130ish range. (Buffalo real estate is very inexpensive).

    I am going to try and get it sold on our own... my Dad has a lot of experience with selling and buying homes as this is probably his 10th property or so. I am not worried about the attachment issues or not knowing the legalities and things of that nature... I am worried that Realtors might be turned off if we don't offer a commission and selling without them could be difficult. I think getting on MLS is a must, does anyone have a service they recommend for that?

    Here is the beginning basics of the website I made for him... keep in mind I am a beginner but I would love any positive or negative feedback. The house is located close to the city of Buffalo, NY so I put Buffalo in the domain.

    the domain is buffalo-houses dot com for anyone that wants to check it out... i havent posted enough yet to post links!

    These are just pictures my Dad took but I have a wide angle lens with a DSLR and I am going to go out and take proper pictures and add them. One thing I would like to change is the call to action is poor. I have a contact forum but I would like it to be easier for people to send me an email who are interested. Thanks again for all the feedback.

    I'd love to sell the place through IM as a type of experiment and share the success or failure on this thread through those tactics. Who knows, maybe tweak the site and work my realtor and create a lead gen site through SEO. Thanks again all!
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    • Profile picture of the author Bill Farnham
      Couple of thoughts...

      Your website appears to pretend to be a site that features "for sale by owner" properties as opposed to the specific property you're trying to move. Unless you plan on adding a lot more houses to that site, this is a bad idea.

      Don't lose focus.

      If your real goal is to sell this specific property then zero-in on that property and that property only.

      When someone goes to the website they will see a massive McMansion which then makes your house look like the cooks quarters. This is not good, and puts your property in a bad light, imho.

      Your house should be front and center and showcased as such.

      One thing you need to keep in mind is the market for a house in those price ranges. That is a completely different market than the McMansion crowd. Build your website for folks who aspire to own the type of property you are selling. This current version does not meet that criteria.

      My advice to you is to construct a much more focused website and drop all pretentions and misdirects. Those tactics have no place in the equation.

      ~Bill
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      • Profile picture of the author EMuu
        Thanks! I agree... the picture was the one that came with the wordpress theme. This is my first attempt at using wordpress and still figuring out where within the code that picture is so I can replace it. I can change the the about us... any suggestions on a better call to action?
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        • Profile picture of the author Bill Farnham
          One of the things you want the website to exude is simplicity. The WP theme you've chosen is a tad more complicated than it needs to be for your purposes. If you need to fill out extrainious boxes just for the sake of filling them out so they won't be blank then you need to get rid of them.

          And at the bottom of the pages is a link for "Quit Claim Deeds". This may raise red flags unless someone understands it goes to another site and is merely advertising. Ditch it or use another theme if that theme requires you advertise in exchange for use privileges.

          The call to action you're looking for is to drive someone to request a physical tour of the house, or at least a personal contact with the seller. What you want to provide on the site are the particulars that would make someone believe your house is a good candidate for their needs.

          ~Bill
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          • Profile picture of the author EMuu
            All good stuff Bill. I checked out a few themes... I am going to stick with this one and just deleted the extra stuff on the sides. Any idea on how to change the image of the Mansion? I just searched in the code editor and deleted out things like "links" etc... but its a little harder to search for an image because so many come up. I appreciate all the helpful information.
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  • Profile picture of the author fitz10
    Do what you already suggest plus put it up on Zillow and Trulia and pay a couple hundred to have it listed in MLS. You can definitely get buyers from Craigslist, YouTube, Google, etc. but the most people are searching MLS for houses and it's crucial in my opinion to be there.
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  • Profile picture of the author EMuu
    I just want to say thank-you to everyone who put their thoughts out there on this. We went live on the house last night around 6 PM. I put together a website and real professional looking video. Then put out Craigslist Ads, Ebay Classifieds, Zillow and a few local advertisements. (Trulia required me to be with a Realtor to list a price)

    Well the first open day on the market my Dad hosted 6 different potential buyers. One was a guy who drove by and saw the sign and the other 5 came from CL and Zillow. I am hoping I installed the Analytics correctly and that it takes a day to for them to deliver the information because I also ran a Google Adwords campaign. Tomorrow I will post the results of the analytics. The youtube video recieved 54 views in one day as well (prob about 20 of them from me and facebook friends).

    All in all he already has one offer on the table for full price at $144,900. By not going with a realtor and selling on his own he saves $8,694 if he sells at that price. I love internet marketing but this is by far the most rewarding client I have worked with. It feels good to use a skill set to help out my parents who have done so much for me through the years. Thank you all!
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  • Profile picture of the author EMuu
    I need 15 posts to post a link... sooo...
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  • Profile picture of the author EMuu
    Here it is the Video Tutorial of the home using ScreenFlow which was a huge hit with people checking out the home.. (in the next post)
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  • Profile picture of the author EMuu
    Video Tour -
    Website Simplified Thanks to Bill Farnham's advice - Buffalo-Houses.com
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  • Profile picture of the author remega
    I am a real estate investor and can tell you that if you value your time, Stay Away From Realtors. Realtors are Deal Killers. They most often do Not work in the best interest of their clients. They work in the best interest of their paycheck. This can lead to you never getting offers you should be getting. I do work with realtors but it's always under My Terms and Conditions. They either work my way or they can hit the highway. I only use realtors to bring me deals and they have the option to then retail that deal if they can produce a cash buyer. You have to go through about 50 realtors to find 1 that is not a time waster. If you are doing this on your own and don't have that much time to waste, I highly recommend selling yourself.

    Offline gambits sell Faster than online. Especially if you are in the location of the property.

    If your property is over financed or behind on payments, PM me and I'll get you some info on how I can buy your home.
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  • Profile picture of the author GodMode52
    I would invest 500$ to make a nice and professional video and then i would use the power of social networks. Ebay is also user friendly for this..
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    • Profile picture of the author EMuu
      I agree with using your saved money from not using a realtor on your own marketing expenses but $500 even seems a little steep... I believe ScreenFlow goes for $99 which is what I used for the video above... granted I used $1,500 in photo/video equipments. But a basic point and click and flip cam could make a comprable video as well. Screen Flow was crazy easy to learn as well.
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  • Profile picture of the author azmanar
    Originally Posted by EMuu View Post


    Does anyone have any suggestions on ways to help them sell the home. I would really appreciate any help especially since it is just to help my parents who did so much for me growing up. Thanks!
    Consider Craigslist.
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