FSBO and You: Selling Your Home

Home owners can save a lot of money by selling their own home as "for sale by owner" or, as it is known in the real estate industry, FSBO (fizz-bow). People list their homes for sale with Real Estate agents everyday, and when their homes sell their agent takes a percentage of the sale which leaves the seller with less money. If home owners list their home For Sale by Owner, or FSBO, they can potentially save thousands of dollars.

Yes, home owners do have to do all of the work on their own. There are computer listing systems that sellers can pay for to put the house in which will give sellers access to all of the potential buyers who are looking at listings through traditional agencies. Then, when a real estate agent pulls up all of the listings for a potential buyer in a certain price range, that listing would be in the listings.

Remember that even though you do not have an agent and are selling the house as a FSBO, the people interested in purchasing the home may have an agent. The best way to keep an agent or a broker from deterring their clients from purchasing a for sale by owner property is to offer a buyer agent commission. This is where the sellers pay a flat fee commission or percentage commission to the agent of the buyers so that their agents will be willing to show the listed property to potential buyers. Sellers may end up paying this fee, but it will be small in comparison to what would have been paid if you had had a real estate agent instead of selling by yourself.

When selling the property it is also important to market and advertise the FSBO property. Create informational flyers to hand out to any interested buyers. Put a sign in the yard with your phone number for people to call and enquire about the FSBO listing. There are even information tubes or boxes that sellers can purchase to attach to the for sale sign, and then fill with the flyers you made so that people driving by can stop and get instant information about your FSBO.