Selling Your Property Yourself

I am curious at the success rates of owners selling their own properties, without an agent.
Has anyone decided to do so, and why?
Is there a 'best' method to apply, like listing on one of the myriad of websites, getting your own signs printed, advertising yourself?
Where would you advertise? How would you bring your property to peoples attention?
Is there a forum for investors anywhere where private sellers and buyers can negotiate the price, or discuss the feasibility of a sale?
A serious site that most of you investors frequent to check out what is on offer.
Just sick of real estate agents trying to set the highest price on my properties in order to get the most commission. I have bought a lot of property, but only sold 1, so now it is time to put on a different hat. Land tax is killing me and I want to retire!:)
 
I reckon if you had good sales/negotiation skills it would be a viable option. These days it doesn't need to be advertised in an agency's window re.com has almost become the default advertising medium anyway.

If in doubt, you could always offer it to an agency on a non exclusive contract as well but I have only seen that sort of thing in country towns..
 
Sold one cheapie on gumtree.

Have the other not-so-cheapie on gumtree with zero responses so far.

Whenever we actually have a date that we can sell the house by (my one big problem with selling is simply that we have no fixed date when the house will be available) I'm going to put flyers up on all the local noticeboards, already have an ad booked in the local paper for next month and will hit the bigger regional paper too.

We'll see how it goes. If it doesn't sell in whatever timeframe we have, it goes up on the local noticeboards for rent, which is how I rented the last house out. Its very very easy to rent a house out around here and slow to sell them, even with rents quite consistently higher than mortgage payments.
 
We sold two of our investment properties ourselves. We only had two people view the first property (one of them bought) and with the other property, we had one person come through, who bought, so we had a fantastic success rate. Both properties only dropped a negligible amount in the haggling process (eg. one sold for 232K, asking price was 235K; the other sold for 220K, asking price was 225K - both one-bed units).

We went through My Home Is For Sale, which enables you to put properties up on realestate.com.au and domain.com.au, and advertised them as viewings by appointment. This thinned out the tyre kickers.

I can thoroughly recommend it, we will do this again next time we need to sell.
 
I used to be an estate agent, I converted a number of for sale by owners homes to exclusive listings after they tried for many months to sell.

I believe its good in a boom market, but in the tough times we are having now, It can be really hard and negotiations become harder if you are the owner.

An agent gets cheaper advertising rates and I'm sure you can negotitate the commission down with most agents.

For the sake of $4k - $8k I would suggest using the best agent in your area.
You should find that the agent can earn you that money back.

You only really get 1 change to sell a home, then people start to down grade your home if its been on the market for a while.
 
I am curious at the success rates of owners selling their own properties, without an agent.
Has anyone decided to do so, and why? Yes, to save on agents fees.
Is there a 'best' method to apply, like listing on one of the myriad of websites, getting your own signs printed, advertising yourself?
Where would you advertise? How would you bring your property to peoples attention? We just put a for sale sign up on the front lawn and advertised it on domain or realestate.com - one of the two can't remember which one.
Is there a forum for investors anywhere where private sellers and buyers can negotiate the price, or discuss the feasibility of a sale? Not sure.
A serious site that most of you investors frequent to check out what is on offer.
Just sick of real estate agents trying to set the highest price on my properties in order to get the most commission. I have bought a lot of property, but only sold 1, so now it is time to put on a different hat. Land tax is killing me and I want to retire!:)

We didn't find it hard to do at all. Our house sold quick and at the price we wanted. Im my opinion a house sells it self. Someone is either going to like it or not like it. If you don't have the time to deal with selling it privately then i would get an agent, but other then that i personally think an agent is an waste of money. Im sure lots would disagree with me which is fine each to their own.
 
Don't forget the comission you pay is not set in stone.. i.e you have the right to neg a lower rate with an agent which most ppl dont know.. if its a highly desirable property you will find some agents will agree to this just to get the listing, however if its going to be one that sits on the books for a while and they have 20 other full comission properties to sell they might not do too much to push yours..
 
I am curious at the success rates of owners selling their own properties, without an agent.
Has anyone decided to do so, and why?
Is there a 'best' method to apply, like listing on one of the myriad of websites, getting your own signs printed, advertising yourself?
Where would you advertise? How would you bring your property to peoples attention?


There is the option of column A and column B. iPostcodes lets you work WITH the agent to sell your property. A great way to balance the expertise and professionalism of the agent, but still maintaining control and ability to contribute.
http://www.ipostcodes.com.au/Post

They say:
"No one knows like you do"
They encourage home owners to inform potential buyers all things that make the property a great place to live.
- Unlimited Photos
- Unlimited Description (ability to include all the details that make the property special)
- Ability to manage incoming enquiries (without disclosing personal details)
- No time limits. No matter how fast or slow, the property is advertised for free on iPostcodes until sold



I'm curious on what everyone's thoughts are though... with all listings, the descriptions will not say something that isn't there, they will only mention what is factual and what any buyer or renter would like to know.
SO, wouldn't you the buyer like to know, that you"restumped the property, and there's a 25 year structural guarantee"

?

Would an agent ever put that in the description?
 
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Bianca, sadly there are no records on the success of an owners selfselling. As an agent, I did think I could handle a "self sale" many years ago. It was an interesting exercise, trying to handle the various "tactics" that buyers tried, knowing I was the seller. I did find, that most buyers were not truthful, and while I can appreciate people saying that they have not the same emotional connection with an investment property, than they do a PPOR, at the end of the day, I believe every decision, is an emotional one, and then justified logically. Look at the big companies, they employ agents across the country, rather that opening branches. I am saddened that I must agree with you, that there are some not so good agents out there, however after many years, I know that there are many that actually "earn their fee". My suggestion is to find one, and enjoy the outcome.
 
I would always engage a real estate agent. Easier to play mind games with buyers, harder for buyers to play mind games with you. The stuff that agents have to put up with/do more than justifies that 2% fee
 
Personally I would be too busy in my dayjob to sell one myself.

We are about to sell a property in Noosa. 1st one we've sold.

Can anyone advise what the rules re agent fees are in Qld?

The agents all seem to quote "The commission structure is 5% of the first $18,000 then 2.5% of the balance thereafter plus GST."

Is there any room for negotiation on these rates and any way we can legally incentivise the agent (eg by giving a higher % for a sale price exceeding a certain amount)? My understand is that there may be some legal rules about this, but am not sure.
 
It may depend a little on the type of property but I agree with Kanemicm. I certainly wouldn't try it in this market. In general terms, buyers are not in a hurry right now & there are much fewer top sales results. This is when I am most inclined to pay for the best sales person that I can get. Even though I am apparently a good salesperson myself (if you talk to my agents ;)) I'm very glad I left my recent sale to the experts.
 
Is there any room for negotiation on these rates and any way we can legally incentivise the agent (eg by giving a higher % for a sale price exceeding a certain amount)? My understand is that there may be some legal rules about this, but am not sure.

Not sure about Qld but in Vic the agent is supposed to tell you that the rates are negotiable. Even if there are no specific rules about it, everything in life is negotiable IMO. What you've suggested is common practice here so give it a shot.
 
For all the rap that they get, agents actually have to do quite a lot of work to deal with the tyre kickers, the genuine buyers and seperate them out
 
Can anyone advise what the rules re agent fees are in Qld?

The agents all seem to quote "The commission structure is 5% of the first $18,000 then 2.5% of the balance thereafter plus GST."

Is there any room for negotiation on these rates and any way we can legally incentivise the agent (eg by giving a higher % for a sale price exceeding a certain amount)? My understand is that there may be some legal rules about this, but am not sure.

that is the highest they can legally charge. http://www.fairtrading.qld.gov.au/property-commission.htm
 
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