A Step-by-Step First Time Seller's Guide

Putting your home on the market can be a stressful process, especially when you don’t know what to expect. Fortunately, with the help of an experienced team of real estate agents and this easy to follow guide, you can smoothly complete the process. Following these steps will help you prepare so you can get organized and sell your home for the best price possible.

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Step 1: Understand Why You're Selling

What do you want to accomplish with the sale of your home? Do you want to make a certain amount of money that you can put toward a larger or nicer home? Do you need to sell it as soon as possible to facilitate a move to a new city or area? Once you understand your needs, you can better craft your offer. For example, if you need to sell quickly, you might want to price your home lower than if your goal is to make a certain profit margin. Make sure you convey these needs to your team of Real Estate Agents once you choose one so they can adjust your selling price accordingly.

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Step 2: Determine Selling Price

Knowing how to price your home is one of the most important parts of the selling process. When you set a fair price in the beginning, you’ll get the most interest from other Real Estate Agents and prospective buyers. Overpricing your home could lead to reduced interest, and underpricing leads to receiving less than what your home is worth. Working with a team of Real Estate Agents is the best way to determine the right selling price for your home. A team of real estate agents with experience can determine what other comparable homes are selling for, evaluate the current market, and may even suggest a home appraisal.

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Step 3: Start Preparations

If you’ve kept your home in showroom condition since you’ve lived in it, you’re in the minority of homeowners. Once you price your home, it’s time to start getting it ready to be shown to potential buyers. This includes getting rid of clutter, depersonalizing the space so that buyers can envision themselves in the space, making any small repairs, and doing a deep clean to make sure your home is in pristine condition.

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Step 4: Develop a Marketing Strategy

We will develop a marketing strategy that is perfect for advertising your home. This involves listing the home and then driving the right people to that listing through social media campaigns, agent-to-agent referrals, traditional media, or SEO advertising. Our team creates a marketing campaign that aims to get the most possible traffic to your listing in the first three weeks after becoming a client.

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Step 5: Evaluate Offers

Receiving an offer is an exciting part of the process, but it doesn’t mean the journey is over. We will evaluate each offer and make sure the party making the offer is prequalified or pre-approved by a mortgage lender and that their offer is acceptable to you. If the offer is too low, you can make a counter-offer or offer other ways to bridge the gap, such as covering some or all of the closing costs, making repairs, adjusting the move-in date, or leaving some appliances or fixtures for the new buyer.

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Step 6: Accept an Offer

Once we deem the offer is acceptable, we will review the proposed contract to make sure it’s all in order and includes the necessary components such as deposit amount, down payment, financing, inspection rights and repair allowances, contingencies, settlement date, and a list of fees and who will pay them. When both parties have agreed to the term, a final contract will be prepared by your team of real estate agents.

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Step 7: Get Ready to Close

You have accepted an offer and are now very close to the end of your selling journey. But first, you and the buyer must make a list of what needs to be done before closing. In some cases, your home may need to be formally inspected, surveyed, and appraised. In other cases, major or minor repairs will need to be made before the house can close. We will head up efforts to develop and execute this list, get each action item paid for by the correct party, and make sure everything is in order by the closing date. A few days before the closing date, we will call the company closing the transaction to make sure everything is ready to go. If you haven’t done so already, you also need to make arrangements to move out of the home so the new buyer can take possession.

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Step 8: Close

You’ve reached the last step in the seller’s process. When you close on a home you are selling, you are legally transferring ownership of the property to the new buyer. We will meet with the company closing the transaction to sign the final paperwork and go over any issues that have not yet been taken care of. During this time, you can also make plans with your team of Real Estate Agents to handle final details such as canceling utilities, cable, and lawn or trash services, changing the name on accounts that the new owner is retaining and ensuring the new owner has instructions for all appliances that will remain in the home.

Congratulations!

Once you have sold your home, you’re free to take the next step on your journey. Whether this is relocating to a new city, moving into a larger home, or downsizing and enjoying your life as empty-nesters, knowing all your selling responsibilities have been taken care of will help you achieve peace of mind for your new path.

Stephen
Savannah
Lawrence D.
Buyer
Pamela E.
Mario M.
WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY
Bee Gee Johnson is an incredible person. If you are looking for help selling or buying any kind of property( homes to farms), you need Bee Gee. She has helped me and my family with purchasing and selling of properties. She stays on top of everything. She most definitely will go to the extreme to protect your rights. I will have her to continue helping me and my family to buy or sell more properties.

— Stephen

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY
Bee Gee has been a respected and trusted family friend for nearly 30 years. I've witnessed her consistent character in many different situations, so when my husband and I needed to purchase our first home in 2018, she was the only realtor we sought out. She coached us patiently throughout the entire process. Her calm demeanor, depth of real estate knowledge, breadth of connections, and quick responses re...

— Savannah

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY
Bottom line, you want to find or sell a property as soon as possible to fit your requirements and need someone who can be your right hand in your real estate needs. Ms. Caldera is an excellent, well-informed, highly experienced Realtor® for the Central Texas region. She is current in real estate business requirements, and seasoned in the various tools available for property acquisition or sale in Texas r...

— Lawrence D.

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY
We highly recommend Laurie, she came recommended to us by people at my wife's hiring company. Sometimes Austin professionals, unlike other areas of the country, are a little more social-network happy than maybe they should be, so we checked to see if she had a crazy posting volume on Facebook or Twitter. She didn't, so we felt like she'd spend extra time on us rather than her social network presence. Boy...

— Buyer

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY
I would recommend Nancy for your real estate needs. She put my Aunts house on the market and some large problems arose. Several times I was in panic mode but Nancy stayed calm, made recommendations and provided phone numbers, and was always available. She was always fast to text back or call. I knew she was working hard for this sale, just like all of her clients. She will not quit, or push you aside unt...

— Pamela E.

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY
Laurie assisted us in finding a home quickly, as the market was moving extremely fast. Coming from San Antonio, she kept us up to speed with emails, text messages, phone calls, and everything else that was necessary for us to obtain a home. She understood exactly what we needed and provided valuable guidance and tips to ensure a successful bid was accepted. Laurie kept in touch with us after helping us f...

— Mario M.

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