How to sell a house fast

Getting into the home buying market is exciting. Selling your current home? Not so much. The only thing more important than making the whole process quick and painless is likely getting top dollar on the market.

If you can combine those two goals, discovering how to sell a house fast without losing out on potential value, you’re doing well.

There are a few different ways to approach the home sale process, and some tips to follow while carrying out your chosen selling strategy. Every home is different, and so is every sale. Finding the exact right buyer and sale channel for you is a unique journey, and one worth taking.

Why would you think about selling quickly?

There are plenty of reasons to sell your house quickly. After all, you don’t want it to sell slowly. Stretching out the sale process can be a burden on your peace of mind as you deal with the pressures of having a house on the market. A quick sale takes you away from the uncertainty.

Of course, there are more specific reasons why you might want to sell the house in a hurry, such as:

• You’ve already taken a job in another city and are ready to relocate: If you have a date set to move to a new city, state or even country, you don’t want to have a house still for sale, complicating your financial picture and demanding attention. When it’s time to go, it’s really time to go. Of course, this can lead to you putting the house on the market at a suboptimal time of the year, when it’s a buyer’s market. You’ll have to be tactical to get maximum value for the home.
• You have a quick path to a new home: Even if you’re not leaving your state or city, there’s every chance that you’ll want the stability and surety that come from receiving an offer on your old house. If you know your asking price has been met, you can be much more certain about what size, type and location of new home you can afford.
•  Life circumstances have made a quick sale important: Not every home sale comes about because of a straightforward desire to move. If you’re dealing with unpredictable circumstances — for instance, being willed a house by a relative — it may be far simpler to sell fast rather than dealing with the property for a long time.

Of course, the flip side of selling quickly is that you want to receive good value for the house. In the years following your home sale, you may be struck with regrets if the process didn’t lead to a fair price.

What are some of the basics of a quick sale?

So, how can you balance your desire for a fast sale with the importance of getting a fair price for the property? It is possible to “have it all” if you approach the sale carefully.

You have access to a few strategic tools here. For instance, you can pursue an alternative selling approach, rather than accepting an offer from a buyer applying for a standard mortgage loan. This might mean a sale to a cash buyer or iBuyer, or if your financial situation has become difficult, a short sale. You can also put care into the way you market the house, steering clear of red flags for potential buyers.

Of course, these tactics aren’t mutually exclusive. If you’re angling for an alternative sale, it can still pay to use the same kinds of tactics that boost a house’s appeal on the general market.

Selling to a cash buyer

When you accept a cash offer, the process is a lot like a standard sale, but the financing is different. Rather than waiting for the seller to finalize mortgage approval, you simply accept the offer. The buyer then transfers you the agreed-upon asking price, which you then use a portion of to pay off your existing home loan balance, with the rest becoming your funds.

There are a few advantages to making a cash sale — for example, this sale process is often a few weeks quicker than a standard sale involving a mortgage. The buyer may also skip other steps of the process. Since the intent of a cash buyer may be to resell the house instead of living in it, the buyer might not make you deal with a detailed home inspection or appraisal.

The lack of a lender means the sale hinges on whether the cash buyer does indeed have the funds to buy the house. As long as the fund verification goes well, however, you’re in line for a relatively quick and painless closing process.

The strengths of the cash option include its speed and relative simplicity. As for the weaknesses? You can’t necessarily summon a cash buyer merely by wishing for one. You still have to find a potential buyer interested in making the purchase, and one who is willing to meet your asking price.

In a seller’s market, you may have no shortage of people lining up to make strong offers. Both you and the buyer may be wishing for a quick resolution in this case, which is a perfect match. In a buyer’s market, however? The offers may disappoint. This means timing is critical when it comes to hoping for a cash sale.

iBuying with Bungalo®: An exciting cash sale option

When it comes to cash sales, there is an alternative to this alternative method: You can investigate an iBuyer, a digital seller that works without some of the traditional hallmarks of the open market.

While selling with a real estate agent may be normal for the more standard house sales, going with a modern option is a way to cut out the agent fees without losing out on an assured, high-quality selling experience. An iBuyer can give you the direct sale process you’re looking for.

Of course, not every one of these iBuyers is going to offer you equal terms on the sale or closing costs. For instance, Bungalo’s service fees are set at 3%, while others in the market tend to charge 5-12% and may ask sellers to have repairs done before they finalize the deal.

What makes a sale via Bungalo so streamlined compared to a normal sale? The way offers are formulated is one important consideration. Instead of haggling or making a lowball offer like an individual buyer might, Bungalo simply creates a fair cash offer based on the prices of other houses in your neighborhood.

On top of that simplified approach to pricing, Bungalo dispenses with the presentation elements of selling a home. You don’t have to clean the house and stage it for potential buyers, because there is no open house and only a single party making the purchase. The selling process is mostly carried out remotely, so you can stay safe at home while the cash sale is going on.

There is even the option to stay in the house through the leaseback program, which is unique from other iBuyers. Even after making the sale, you can lease the right to remain in the home for up to a year while you conduct your own home search. This can keep the fast sale from becoming too fast and leaving you between houses.

Selling via a short sale

A short sale isn’t something you actively pursue. This kind of sale is the result of financial pressure, with the value of the home declining lower than the remaining value of the mortgage.

While a short sale isn’t a good thing from a financial standpoint, it is an alternative to suffering a foreclosure, along with all the ongoing repercussions of having the bank foreclose on the property.

The general theme of a short sale is mitigating and minimizing losses. The lender is not gaining maximum value from the sale and you, as the seller, are leaving without positive value from the sale. The deal also presents some complexities for the buyer, who will have to deal with extra-legal requirements compared to a basic mortgage loan sale.

There’s yet another complication — a short sale will take a very variable amount of time-based on the negotiations between the lender and the buyer. This means that a short sale might also be a quick sale, but you can’t count on that. There are a lot of moving parts in a legal sense, so it may actually take longer than an average transaction.

The bottom line with a short sale is that it may be something you have to do. In times when property values are falling in your area and your loan has become unmanageable, there’s little option about the matter. A short sale may be the only way to walk away without a devastated credit score.

With that said, short selling is not the kind of process you can use tactically. It is something to only be undertaken in specific and demanding circumstances.

Preparing your home to facilitate a quick sale

The amount and type of preparation you’ll have to do to get your house ready for sale depends heavily on what type of method you’re considering. Directly seeking out a cash offer by an iBuyer or a similar path is different from the conventional way of selling a house, for instance.

Going for the conventional quick sale

If you just want to put the house on the market and hope it will sell as quickly as possible, there are a few specific tactics you can use to make sure the house has maximum curb appeal and is welcoming to potential buyers.

• Quick repairs and renovations: When you’re setting out to make your home as immediately appealing to buyers as possible, a little work can go a long way. Of course, engaging in a lengthy renovation would defeat the purpose of a fast sale, but small painting projects and work on tiling, doors and more can give your potential buyers a great first impression.
• Staging for tours and open houses: When your house has been staged for potential buyers, that means it has been tidied, organized and made less personal. With fewer traces of your personal preferences, homebuyers will be able to project their own goals for the house onto the space. This can lead to a quick conventional home sale.
• Don’t skimp the listing photos: A huge portion of the home buying process involves potential buyers clicking through photos of homes for sale. If the pictures of your house look better than the rest, you’ve received a major boost before any homebuyers have set foot on the property. The extra cost of hiring a professional photographer can pay off in a quick sale.

On top of the little tasks around the house, there’s a major sticking point: your asking price. This will be determined by a wide variety of factors, including the area and the overall conditions of the housing market. There’s no question, however, that it can help you make a conventional home sale faster.

If you hold out and insist on a high asking price, that may add some time to the sale process, especially in a buyer’s market. It’s clear and understandable that when people see a bargain, they’ll be more inclined to move quickly and more able to make a cash offer. The question then becomes how low you’re willing to go in the name of accelerating the sale.

The alternative: Preparing for cash sale via Bungalo

Making a quick home sale by conventional means involves preparing the property in a number of ways and then hoping for the best. While this works out in some cases, especially when the real estate market is seller-friendly, it’s understandable if you want to find a clearer, more straightforward alternative.

Selling through Bungalo can be the alternate route you’re looking for. Nearly every component of the sale process changes when you sell through Bungalo instead of putting the house on the market, and these differences often favor a fast sale. You can see this by taking it point by point:

• Repairs: It’s not necessary to fix the issues with your house. If there’s a high-level need that requires addressing, it will be reflected in the offer. The onus isn’t on you as the homeowner to go through the time-consuming process of repairing the house. Many other iBuyers can’t make this same offer.
• Staging and photos: There are no open houses or home tours, and you don’t have to put together an online listing for potential homebuyers to browse. That means the process of staging your house and having it professionally photographed isn’t necessary. You can simply proceed with the sale, get your offer and decide whether to take it.
• The price: Setting your asking price and trying to gauge the market’s appetite for your house is one of the inescapable complications of a conventional home sale. With Bungalo, you escape the inescapable. You simply look at the offer price and decide whether this is the right amount for you. Since it’s based on real data regarding your area, the number is designed to be fair.

Offers don’t come with an obligation to sell, so you can request yours and see whether this is the path you’d like to take for a quick sale.

Whatever choice you end up making, it’s an exciting time — making a move and finding a new home are big events, and selling your previous house is an essential part of making the transition possible.

Of course, a quick sale deserves a quick purchase. When you’re seeking to speed up your house search, you can go for a streamlined and modernized take on homebuying, as well. In other words, Bungalo may be a great option for you as a buyer, too.

This article is meant for informational purposes only and is not intended to be construed as financial, tax, legal, real estate, insurance, or investment advice. Bungalo always encourages you to reach out to an advisor regarding your own situation.