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Los Angeles, CA - California
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Mackinaw City, MI - Michigan
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Memphis, TN - Tennessee
Miami, FL - Florida
Manchester, NH - New Hampshire
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Pierre, SD - South Dakota
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San Diego, CA - California
San Francisco, CA - California
Seattle, WA - Washington
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Tampa , FL - Florida
Toledo, OH - Ohio
Topeka, KS - Kansas
Tulsa, OK - Okalahoma
Washington, DC - District of Columbia
Wichita, KS - Kansas

Home Inspectors Directory AL

Home Inspectors Directory AK

Home Seller Information

Pre-Listing Home Inspection

It is pretty safe to assume that a buyer who contracts to buy your house will want to have a professional whole house inspection conducted. Most sale contracts are written with a "contingent upon an acceptable whole house inspection" clause. So why not wait until you have a buyer who want and will pay for an inspection? While many sellers do wait for just this situation, there are a few compelling reasons for you, the seller, to invest in a professional whole house inspection before listing your house.

1) If you are planning to do any cosmetic repairs before listing your house, an inspection may reveal additional defects that your cosmetic repairs could have masked. A pre-listing inspection gives you the opportunity to fix possible underlying problems right the first time. This saves you the time, trouble, and money of fixing a seemingly small repair, then finding out there is a larger problem, forcing you to destroy your work, fix the underlying problem, and then do the cosmetic repair all over again.

2) You will know, in advance, of defect. You will have an opportunity to repair them before the first potential buyer ever sees your house. Experience has shown that when a buyer, through their own house inspection, finds a defect, they tend to look for more.

3) A completed whole house signals to buyers that you are a conscientious seller. If a buyer is torn between two houses - your house and another that has not been pre-inspected -- it is very possible that they may feel more comfortable with yours.

4) It removes an "unknown" from your selling process. There are plenty of "unknowns" when you sell a house -- when will it sell? How much will it sell for? Will the buyer's financing be approved? By discovering (and repairing) any defects up front, you remove at least one uncertainty from the selling process.

Why You Need A Realtor

The majority of home sellers take on the task with an ally: a Real Estate Agent. They feel that it is better to entrust the sale of their biggest investment to a professional, rather than attempting to learn about selling a house in a trial and error method. In addition, many people would rather use an Agent due to the complexities of modern Real Estate transactions since they usually incorporate legal and financial attributes, which takes them well beyond more simple transactions, such as the sale of an automobile.

Some of the other advantages of working with Agents that home sellers will list include: access to the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) so that large numbers of buyers will have access to the seller's property, the fact that the Agent absorbs all of the cost of advertising and marketing, and the screening that will be done of potential buyers by Agents. In addition, the Agent handles the lion's share of the details of negotiation.

Deciding whether to use an Agent or not has a great deal to do with what you feel the level of your capabilities are. If you feel fully confident that you can handle all of the details, then you may well want to attempt selling your house on your own. If not, you most likely will want to use an Agent and leave the details on them.

How To Get Top Dollar When Selling Your House

Give your family members assigned jobs in advance that will go into action when a short-notice showing is scheduled. Everyone must know their duties and carry them out, so that they do not end up banging into one another trying to get everything done quickly.

Open every window covering. All drapes and curtains. Blinds should be positioned to let in maximum light. Buyers like a house to be "light and bright," so accommodate them! Turn on as many lights as possible.

Make sure the house smells good. Baking cookies, often recommended, may be overdoing it, but pet odors, smoke, or greasy cooking odors definitely will not work! Air out the house just before they arrive.

Six very important words: no clutter, no clutter, not clutter!

Make sure that everything is spotless. Pay particular attention to the bathrooms and the kitchen. In the bathrooms, towels should be fresh and clean, sinks and baths scrubbed, and the floor freshly cleaned. In the kitchen, make sure all the dishes are put away and countertops and sinks cleaned.

Check the thermostat to make sure that the house is at a comfortable temperature.

Remove pets from the house, or at least, keep them outside. Pets under foot will quickly put a damper on an otherwise positive showing.

Make sure Fact Sheets are available and easily accessible. (The dining room table is an ideal place for them).

If you are using an Agent, leave. If this is not possible, make yourself as inconspicuous as possible. If it is comfortable outside, go there until the buyers leave. If you are selling on your own, of course, you do not have this luxury.

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