House Selling Crazy Idea?

[dmccarty]

I'll let the TBN Collective tell me if I just came up with a crazy
idea on how to sell our house...... /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

The wife and I where talking last night about how in the heck
we where going to fix up the little things on our house, put it
on the market, and build a new house. The usuall issues when
trying to build a new house while selling a current house.

A light bulb turned on, dimly at first but growing ever brighter
as a certain idea took root.... Y'all can tell us if the light is
really dull! /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

Our current house is in a "good" section of town. Good local
schools and the kids get to go to the local schools not bused
off for various reasons. While we are in the good section
of town we are most definately one of the low rent areas so
to speak. Unfortunately it really is going rental. The houses
on both sides are rental as is another across the street. The
subdivision has a large percentage of rentals due to the homes
age, size, and location. Not many people want to live in a
1250 sf home in this city....

Soooo, the idea is to call up the owners of the houses of the
rental houses and see if they would be interested in our
house. But we would not just ask the owners of the three
houses we would also call up the companies that manage
rental houses and see if they or their clients would be
interested in purchasing our house.

The advantage to this is that we would have serious buyers
from the start and would not have to have people calling us
as odd hours. Nor would we have to worry about keeping the
house spot free, which is hard to do with a two year old and two dogs.

We figured we would do this somewhat like how we sold our
timber. Have the interested parties look at the house. Give
them a couple of weeks and have them send us a bid for the
house. If we get an acceptable bid we take it. If not we are
left with selling the house the old fashioned way.

The wife will start calling the owners and companies this
week or next and ask if the would be interesting in looking at
our house when it goes on the market in a few months. We
will spend some time to fix up the little things that need to
get done and make the house show better.

Are we nuts?

Thanks,
Dan

 

[bgott]

You could give it a try. See if your area's tax collector has a website you can use to run the addresses around you to find the owners if you don't know them already. You wouldn't have to fix the house up drop dead perfect, renters are just going to destroy it anyway. You will probably get a higher price from an individual investor than from a real estate investment company. How is the real estate market where you're at? Around here all you have to do is put up a sixty nine cent For Sale sign and the house is gone. I keep the word out that I'm looking for properties, most dirt in this neighborhood is sold by word of mouth.

 

[Gatorboy]

Sorry, but I think your idea will not pan out well.

If you want to RENT your house that is one thing, but finding current renters to buy your house is not the way to go. If they were ready and able to buy, they would have by now.

The housing market is still ON-FIRE, so if you want to sell it, get a Realtor.

 

[dmccarty]

Bgott,

Our county does have the owner and selling information online.
We have a good idea on the houses value but we are going
to see what they have been selling for lately. We are not
going to spend a bunch of money fixing things up. Just a
little things that need to get done. You are right the rental
owner ain't going to want perfection which is another reason
we are thinking this approach might be the best way to go.

The market is interesting. I hear it is a buyer market but I
think that depends on WHAT and WHERE the location of the
house. The three rules of real estate. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif My area has
lost something like 6,000 IT jobs over the last year or so. We
went to a Parade of Homes show last fall and the cheapest
homes that we saw in several subdivision was around 300,000
dollars! One subdivision had homes where the cheapest house
was just a tad under $500,000!!!!! This was right before
the big stock market meltdown and the major layoffs. I really
don't see how people could afford these homes even on two
incomes.....

I was talking with my banker the other day and she mentioned
that homes over 300,000 dollars where not moving very fast.
DUH! That is a two income house and if you just lost a job
you are going to have to sell. And if you are already in such
a house you are most likely on hold buying anything else until
the economy gets better.

Well our house is under $150,000 and they seem to be selling
in our subdivision. Even if we had to sell via the For Sale sign
route I think it will move pretty quickly since its a good first
home. And the location, schools, etc. The apartment rental
market is overbuilt but even with that over supply one can
buy the houses in our neighborhood and get more square
footage than paying rent.

My land is in another county and I was down at the court
house looking up some things at the tax and deeds offices. It
still blows my mind on the amount of info that is available....

Thanks,
Dan

 

[dmccarty]

GatorBoy,

We are not really interested in selling our house to the RENTERS.

We are going to talk to the OWNERS of the rental houses to
see if they want to buy our house. One of the RENTERs we
think might be interested in buying but I really don't want
to deal with him. These owners are investers and are looking
for property to buy.

When one of our neighbors was selling his house I was working
in the yard when the agent showed up with a client. My
neighbor walked out and we started talking. I told him the
client was going to buy for an investment and he would never
live in the house. Which is what happened. The house on the
other side is owned by a couple that invest in houses and rent
them out. They have a very nice Merc. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

I won't use an agent. Don't need one. The house will sell
fairly quickly anyway. And we have a friend who is an agent
who has already offered to help us sell the house.

What we are trying to avoid is the phone calls at all hours,
the unannounced "viewers", etc. We think this approach will
work. We are going to find out. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

Later...
Dan

 

[RobS]

One thing we thought of but never tried was to put a sign in the yard like this:

"This house WILL be for sale"

Figured if people were truly interested they may stop/call or whatever but since it wouldn't actually be listed we wouldn't probably get the tourists.

Didn't do it and we ended up selling for top dollar in two weeks once we listed.

Your idea of contacting other landlords has merit I'd say. Sure won't hurt to try /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[Mosey]

Dan – I’m not experienced at the process of selling one house and buying or building another. I would really like to know how that is done! But, I will throw out one idea.

Right now and probably for a while, it's a buyers market. So, why not just rent the house yourself? My brother is renting a house and the rental is paying the mortgage! He bought it as a possible future home for his 17 year old son. So far it's working out good. You do have to screen the tenants though, very carefully. It’s an idea I'm considering myself. I'm in kind of a dilemma right now. I need more square footage, so I'm trying to figure out if would be better for me to build an addition, or find another house with the square footage I need. The hard part is finding it on some acreage like I have now and actually I’d like to have more acreage. If I do find the "right" house, I'm going to look into renting my current house until the market changes over to a sellers market. Don't know if it that can be done or not, it's just an idea.

Your profile says you have 54 acres, is that where you’re planning to build?

 

[Gatorboy]

<blockquote><font size=1>In reply to:</font><hr>

What we are trying to avoid is the phone calls at all hours,
the unannounced "viewers", etc.

<hr></blockquote>



If that is what you are trying to avoid, then get yourself a Real Estate Agent. Problem solved -- and you'll get your house sold without any headaches associated with trying to do it yourself.

I suspect that in the end, you will end up with a Real Estate Agent (IMHO).

 

[TimSullivan]

Your idea is not crazy but not likely to get you the most money for your home.

My father started me in the rental business 35 years ago. He rented many single family homes but always tried to buy them very right. Usually 20% below market was what he was looking for.

His most successful time was in the middle of January and February in Western New York. Can you think snow? It is true that these were distressed sales. I do not think you want to put yourself in that situation.

Also when you contact the owners of rentals, they immediately think may be they can get a bargain. I have sold many income properties myself just with an ad in the paper. On the flip side my personal homes have always been sold by a realtor.

We just sold our present house in two hours. Our area is a seller's market right now and here is how it went. On Friday we signed the listing and placed signs on the property. All calls were directed to the realtor and he told people no one was going to see the house until the following Wednesday. Several people drove by, stopped and looked and it was fun seeing the same cars return for another outside look. I did have to ask some people to leave the property and not look in the windows. Then again our 95 pound Giant Schnauzer usually took care of that problem.

On Wednesday night at 5 P.M. the first three realtors and their clients arrived. The rest arrived shortly after and we had full price offers from three parties. One additional offer was for more than the asking price. I have always been successful selling both income and our own homes. I have never had one of our personal homes take more than two weeks to sell and that includes five houses.

I would suggest that you find the best and busiest agent in you area. Please don't go hiring a friend, family member or someone just starting out. You will pay the same commission so get the most successful agent you can. My agent for the last two homes I have sold is the managing realtor for the largest firm in our three county area. He has sold both homes the day they were opened to buyers. You just can't beat that. Also both houses sold for more that the asking price. Pricing the house correctly is the single most important aspect of selling. Some sellers want to try a high price and then come down. They lose all the leverage that a new house to the market has. It is now a house that has been passed over and is now old merchandise. If you know the value of the house then deduct 5% and that is what most houses bring. So start it there and sell it fast and sometimes you even get the extra 5% because the buyer does not want to lose the house.

If I were you, I would look at renting the home and use the present interest advantage to build equity in two properties instead of just one. It is so nice to have the years go by and one day the last mortgage payment is made for you. I grew up painting and cleaning up after tenants. That may not be something you want to do. Just take out a piece of paper and list the costs of selling and then look at the rent you will receive less the carrying costs. Make some calls to property managers and have them give you a list of their services and the rent they feel appropriate for your house. It does not mean that you have to hire them.

Your house sounds like a perfect candidate for a rental. The area already has rentals so your neighborhood will not be up in arms because you are renting your old home. It is smaller than many of the new homes and in my area it is the perfect rental size.

I did not expect to be talking about rental property on a tractor site and I guess I got carried away. If you want more information or want me to look at some numbers, I would be happy to do that for you. I have learned so much from knowledgeable tractor people on this site and now I can talk about something more familiar to me.

 

[bgott]

If nothing else, rent it out for a couple of years and then sell it. If you own a house that you use as your primary residence for two out of five years you can sell it tax free. Pull a couple of years income out of it and let it appreciate and then sell it.