Selling quickly to meet a deadline is a common concern for home sellers. A recent National Association of Realtors survey found that 55% of home sellers were in a hurry when they put their home for sale. Some of the most important items to keep in mind when selling with a deadline are: |
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| Preparing your home for the saleIn most neighborhoods, if you must close on your home sale within 8 to 10 weeks, then you should put your home on the market quickly and not delay for home preparation. Remember, most closings occur 4 to 6 weeks after you have found a buyer and agreed on price. Consider hiring a cleaning service to thoroughly clean your house if you don't have time. Follow the advice contained in BuySelf's advice on Preparing Your Home, but remember that any delay for you to prepare your home may be costly. |
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Pricing your home for salePricing appropriately is even more important for sellers with a deadline. Consider hiring an appraiser (BuySelf can supply a list of available appraisers) that can quickly suggest a value for your property. Calculate the financial and dollar cost of missing your deadline. If you are relocating to another city, don't forget to calculate:
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| Bad time of year to sellAs for the time of year, there are few bad times of the year to sell your home. The Twin Cities marketplace
is seasonal, but not as much as people often expect. January and
February have the fewest numbers of closings, meaning that showings
and offers are at their lowest levels in December and January.
However, don't assume that December or January is a bad time to sell
your home, because many times in the past years there has been a
shortage of available listings because many sellers did not try to
sell, whereas the buyers still wanted to buy a home, so the market was
very favorable to sellers.
The following chart shows the level of
activity for each month, and each of the years displayed are fairly
typical years.
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The percentage figures on the left side of the chart reflect the number of
closings that occurred in that month when compared to the to total
closings for the year.
4 Essential Questions to ask an MLS listing company before you list Click here if you are considering selling without any help. Click here if you are considering paying for a full-priced agent. 
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