3 Ways To Sell Your House

The MLS stands for “Multiple Listing Service” and is the official Realtor’s database of all the homes that are currently on the market.

This is where all the local buyers agents go to find homes for sale for their buyers and 90% of buyers are working with a buyers agent to find a home.

If your home is not listed in the MLS you are missing out on the largest pool of buyers, which could seriously hinder the sale of your home AND prevent you from getting the most amount of money possible.

Please Note: As a home seller, you do not have access to the MLS directly, unless you either list your home with a real estate agent for a high listing commission or you can get access by purchasing one of our listing plans for a low flat fee.

They will directly contact you!

You MLS listing will have instructions in the MLS under the “Showing Instructions” for buyers and agents to get in contact with you directly to set up showings.

You will provide the best way to get in contact with you, either through email, phone or even text.

Anytime a buyer or agent gets in contact with the listing office, they will either give them your contact information or forward their contact information to you.

Please Note: you can not put your contact information in the description of your home, that is a violation of the MLS rules.

1 business day.

Please Note: A lot of times your home can be listed the same day, depending on if you follow the instructions quickly, but always plan on 1 business day and you won’t be disappointed.

YES!

In order to be listed on the MLS, home sellers are required to offer a Buyer’s Agent Commission.

But you only have to pay that commission if your property is sold to a buyer who is represented by an agent. If the buyer does not have an agent, you don’t pay a commission AT ALL!

The average commission is 2-3%, so we usually recommend that you offer in that range.

Think about it this way, a buyers agent job is to find homes for their buyers but they also want to get paid for their time and effort, just like you do at your job. Motivate all the buyers agents out there to work FOR YOU by offering a 2-3% commission and get your home sold.

The correct local MLS for you area!

There are over 800 MLS’s throughout the country and we make sure to list your home in the correct local MLS.

Please Note: If for some unforeseen reason we can not list your home in the correct local MLS, we will present you with alternative options or process a refund for you.

YES!

Once your listing is live on the MLS, you will receive another set of instructions with how to make changes to your listing.

Please Note: You will not be able to update the MLS directly. Only our brokers are allowed to add/modify listings according the MLS rules. Typically changes are made same day but always plan for 1 business day turnaround time.

It is called an “Exclusive Agency” listing agreement.

This means that the agreement you sign allows our service to enter your home for sale on the MLS and all the major real estate portals online.

The agreement is a mandatory requirement for the MLS.

In terms of commission, this is how the agreement works.

• If the property is sold by the seller without any use of a buyers agent, the seller is not obligated to pay a buyers agent commission.
• If the property is sold by a buyers agent, the seller is obligated to pay the agreed buyers agent commission.

Please Note: With our service, you are responsible for handling the sale of your home, we do not provide and typical agent/client representation to you. That allows us to only charge a low flat fee price and not a high commission.

After you make a purchase you will be emailed instructions on how to upload your photos, submit your property information etc.

If for whatever reason you run into issues with uploading the photos using the preferred method, alternative options can be arranged.

It depends.

Most MLS’s will allow a video or virtual tour to be added to your listing but it has to be unbranded.

Please Note: An “Unbranded” video or virtual tour can not include any owner names in text or pictures, with no contact information, logos or other “branding.

Yes!

Zillow, Trulia, Realtor.com, etc are all 3rd party websites and as consumer friendly as they are for searching properties for sale, these websites are businesses.

These websites make money by having real estate agents pay to get buyer “leads” sent to them from people who request a showing or more information from these sites. When buyers start submitting their information on these sites, it doesn’t always go to the listing office. This is a common misconception with these websites and is this way for ALL listings, not just with our service.

With that said, your contact information will not typically be able to be shown on these websites directly and there is also no way to have the real estate agents who pay to be featured on the listings not appear. Like we said, that is how these companies make money.

Please Note: When the local MLS listing broker does get the inquiries from these websites, they forward the contact directly to you so that you can follow up with them directly. The best part is, the contact gets sent to you usually in a couple hours, which is far faster than most real estate agents would respond to any buyer inquiries if you listed with a traditional agent!

Also, most of your inquiries and showing requests will come from buyers agents from the MLS. This is because 90% of buyers are working with agents to find and purchase a home. That is why our MLS listings are so powerful.

When you use this type of service your home will technically be listed with a real estate agent, even though you are retaining the right to sell by owner.

The only way to get on most of these sites is by listing with a real estate agent, so there is no way around that.

Anytime a buyer inquiries on your listing from one of these portals, the inquiry will be forwarded to you so that you can followup with them.

Please Note: One thing to keep in mind, these 3rd party real estate portals will have other real estate agents receive buyer inquiries sent directly to them. These agents pay for those “leads” and we can not prevent them from getting those buyers information. This is how those websites make their money and it works that way for ALL listings, not just our service.

Also, most of your inquiries and showing requests will come from buyers agents from the MLS. This is because 90% of buyers are working with agents to find and purchase a home. That is why our MLS listings are so powerful.

Once your property is listed with our service, the FSBO listing on Zillow will get taken down automatically and replaced by the MLS listing.

This is a good thing because you want all your listings to be consistent with the MLS.

Please Note: You can leave your Zillow FSBO listing online and don’t have to take it down. It will automatically be taken down by our listing.

No, if you are offering a competitive commission for the buyer’s agent and the listing price is appropriate.

We recommend a 2-3% commission for most markets but you can choose what you want.

All agents want to earn a buyer’s agent commission and will be willing to show your home to their buyer clients as long as they know they will be getting paid for their work.

For them it is no different than if your home is listed with a traditional real estate agent.

However, it is critical for your house to be priced correctly for your market. A listing price that is too high will dramatically reduce or eliminate the number of showings.

You do! Or a buyers agent if they are working with one.

Once your home is listed, you will be the primary point of contact that is responsible for the sale of your home. This includes, scheduling and showing your home to prospective buyers.

If the buyer is working with an agent, the agent will typically schedule a showing with you. If you want to allow them access to your home without your presence, we recommend doing some basic validation first.

For example, have the agent text you a picture of their business card for you to research them online before giving them access to your home.

We highly recommend you to NEVER give access to your home to a buyer without your presence and always practice whatever safety measures you are comfortable with, such as ensuring you are not home alone during a showing to an unknown buyer.

The price of our listing plans only includes your MLS listing, ISoldMyHouse.com listing and all the major real estate portals such as Zillow, Trulia, Realtor.com etc.

We have a lot of helpful information on our website to help you out as you go.

We recommend taking a look at our home sellers guide and seeing if feel selling on your own is right for you.

Please Note: If you need extensive assistance with offers or negotiations a full service broker might be a better option. The trade off is having to pay a high listing commission.

Per MLS Rules, sellers must inform the listing agent within 1 business day of signing a contract.

This is very important because they are required to update your listing on the MLS within 1 business day of you entering into a contract with a buyer to purchase your home.

In terms of selling your home, this is where the escrow process begins.

Activities in the escrow process are the buyers getting the home inspected, appraisal being conducted by the mortgage company and working through the buyers getting the mortgage.

Our home sellers guide explains this in more detail.