subject: 5 Tips Before Selling Your House [print this page] Before you officially decide to sell your home you should really come up with a plan that establishes your course of action. It is important to know ahead of time exactly how you plan to have this all work out. It will keep your sanity safe and allow the process to go a lot more smoothly this way. You will also have a greater chance of avoiding any mistakes this way.
First, establish what your reason for selling your home truly is. You really need to evaluate your individual circumstances to be sure it is what you really want to do and didnt just wake up one morning and decide it might be a good idea to sell your home and move. It takes careful time and consideration.
You should also determine what you are going to do for a place to live once you manage to sell your home. Check out local listings in the paper or with your realtor to assess your options for locations to move. You should really have a list of criteria that you are looking for in another home before you officially decide to sell yours. You could also drive through different neighborhoods to make a decision about whether you want to stay where you are or re-locate to a different area that may have more appealing factors surrounding it.
After you do those, you should set forth to begin calling different real estate agents to help you along on the process of both buying and selling. It probably is not a good idea to just jump to the first person that you call because the skills of a realtor are important to determining exactly how fast it sells and if you get your asking price. You should consider 2 or 3 different agents and get ideas of how they plan to sell your home and give you tips on how to prepare it to effectively sell quicker. They should also go over the best and worst case scenarios for selling price to allow you to see the full picture.
Once this has been done, you can find a lender. You could stay with your current lender but be sure to look and shop around for lenders that will provide better deals. One may be offering lower points or even a smaller interest rate than another. Just like the first time you qualified for a mortgage, be sure to get a letter that pre-approves you for a set amount. This helps you tremendously when looking for a home because sellers take you more seriously if they know you are approved for financing.
The last tip is to sell your home before you buy a home. You have no idea how long it will take to sell and you dont want to fall in love with a home after looking at it online or in person to discover that you cant yet purchase it because yours is still on the market. Patience is the key to being successful.
