4 Reasons Why You Should Never Sell Your House FSBO Style

When it comes to selling your house, there are two options to go with. You can either go with a real estate agent or do it yourself. The latter is called FSBO, and it stands for For Sale By Owner. There’s plenty of talk as to which is the better way to do it. But we’re here to tell you why FSBO style is something you shouldn’t do.

If you want to find out why then you’ll have to continue reading. Below you’ll find our 4 reasons why you should never sell your home FSBO. With all that said, let’s start.

You’re Losing Time

The first reason why you should never go FSBO is time. Namely, when you decide to go FSBO, you are sacrificing a lot of time. The home selling process can be quite long. A real estate agent knows the ins and outs of the industry and knows how to sell your house in the quickest way possible.

Going with an agent is an obvious benefit if you’re in a rush. If you’re waiting to sell your house to get preapproved for a loan to buy another house, then it will work in your favor to go with a real estate agent rather than the FSBO way.

You’re Losing Money

Do you even know how to price your home? Are you 100% certain you won’t make the overpricing mistake? Even if you don’t know how to accurately price your home, you can still hire someone to do it for you. But that will cost you money.

If you go with an agent, the expertise in the market is included in the fees. This means you won’t be potentially losing money by over or underpricing your home. More so, you might be thinking going FSBO saves you plenty of costs. That’s simply not true as in reality, you’re only spending more money with nothing guaranteed. Your agent is there to sell your house and to also offer first-hand advice on everything related to the process.

The biggest issue sellers have when hiring an agent is paying the “hefty” commission. This commission is usually between 1 to 3%. That can be a lot of money if the house sells for a lot. But studies show that FSBO sellers lose on average $50,000 compared to sellers that hire real estate agents. This also takes into account the 1 to 3% listing commission. So it’s not really true that FSBO saves you money.

You’re Paying Money Up Front

When it comes to selling your home FSBO style, it means you’ll be in charge of everything. From creating the listing to marketing the sale, there are so many things that cost a lot of money. It’s quite true that you’ll spend thousands of dollars on marketing and advertising the sale. This is all money coming out of your pocket.

So it means you’re paying upfront with, again, nothing guaranteed. That’s not the case when you hire a real estate agent. Real estate agents are tasked with marketing and advertising your home. If they spend a thousand dollars on ads and the house doesn’t sell, then they’re not getting that money back. This is quite possibly the best reason why you should go with an agent. By going FSBO, you are putting your own money at risk for marketing and advertising purposes.

You’re Missing Out On A Trusted Advisor

We keep coming back to the same point. Going FSBO means going solo. That means there are all kinds of things you have to take care of without having the knowledge to do so. FSBO isn’t a better way to sell your house. A huge reason why that isn’t the case is that a real estate agent will give you expert advice on what to do before selling the house.

There are all kinds of repairs, upgrades, and improvements we can do to increase the value of our home before putting it on the market. A real estate agent will recommend these repairs, upgrades, and improvements. More so, they will recommend cost-expensive improvements that cost less than what they offer in return in terms of value. An agent will recommend replacing your old windows with newer ones. They will recommend repairing the backyard deck and making all kinds of cost-effective improvements.

Simply said, by going FSBO you are missing out on a trusted advisor to guide you throughout the process and recommend the appropriate steps to get the most out of the sale.

Finishing Thoughts

Going FSBO is always an option to consider. But if you have no prior knowledge of selling houses or you don’t want to be burdened with the hassle, then going FSBO is obviously a mistake. A real estate agent is an industry professional that knows how to close a sale. More so than that, this is a professional that will take initiative and charge of the whole process, leaving you to do your own thing. Going FSBO is very complex and difficult even for knowledgeable sellers.