The Homeowner’s Guide to For Sale By Owner: Everything You Need to Know to Sell Your Home Yourself and Save Thousands
Author
Jackie Bondanza
Publisher
Atlantic Publishing Company
3 Review Copies Left
American homeowners saw the real estate landscape change in recent years. Most cities in America have buyer s markets, meaning you may have to go that extra mile if you want to sell your home. This book details each benefit that going FSBO can bring you, and explains how you can accomplish this task while saving money. With the help of this new book and companion CD-ROM, selling your home without a realtor or broker will be fast and easy. In this comprehensive and easy-to-understand book, you will learn the entire by owner process from A-Z. You will learn how to set the sales price and how to save the 6 to 8 percent real estate commission, which can add up to thousands or tens of thousands of dollars in savings. You will learn how to prepare or stage your home, have a professional appraisal and home inspection, market, advertise, and show your home, list your home for sale on the Internet, list your home on the Realtor s Multiple Listing Service (MLS), host an open house, and develop and market a fact sheet. In addition, you will learn about mortgage lenders, home inspectors, title companies, escrow agents, the pros and cons of using a For Sale By Owner (FSBO) service, the legal issues, the biggest mistakes FSBO sellers make and how to avoid them, contracts, legal forms, and check lists (all of which can be found on the companion CD-ROM), and when and how to use a real estate attorney. This book also includes dozens of resources and information from real estate experts: mortgage planners, attorneys, escrow agents, and realtors were interviewed for this book. In addition, people who have accomplished selling their own homes were interviewed to give inside tips on how to reach this goal. Let this book be your guide through saving money and selling your house the FSBO way.
Reviews
“The Homeowner’s Guide to FOR SALE BY OWNER” was written by Jackie Bondanza about what a homeowner can do to sell their home. It is directed towards people who wish to sell their home by themselves and not with a realtor. But if you are using a realtor, then this book is just as important for you. The information given is applicable to both the person selling on their own and those selling using an agent.
The book covers many areas such as “Selling in a Buyer’s Market versus a Seller’s Market,” how to price your home, getting the home ready to show, marketing your home, and how to handle the contracts and documents which are part of every sale.
Although this book states in the title that it is for those who wish to sell on their own, this book is just as relevant to the person who chooses to go through a real estate agent. I really liked the part of the book that discussed how to stage your home. The author covers the living room (i.e. to arrange furniture around the fireplace to help accentuate it”, the kitchen (which can make or break a deal), the master bedroom, extra bedrooms, the dining room, the bathrooms, entrances and exits and also how to stage a home office or basement if you have them. She even gives hints on the proper way to photograph your home and the common mistakes that sellers do when photographing their home and which pictures you should put online. At the end of the book she covers the costs associated with selling the home such as which costs are typically paid by the buyer, the seller and which fees are negotiable that can be paid by either.
This book is chock full of information and would benefit any person who wishes to sell their home. It can help take some of the anxiety out by providing the seller the information that is needed to get their home. It is written so that it does not overwhelm the reader.
My only complaint is the CD-ROM that came with it. I have Microsoft 2010 on my computer and I was unable to pull up any of the documents on the CD-ROM. This was disappointing since the information on it included Contract of Offer and Acceptance, Deed of Sale, Buyers Purchase Agreement, and other documents that the seller will need to know about. The good news is that you don’t need the CD-ROM to benefit from the information in this book.
Reviewed on 05/13/2012 by ReviewTheBook.com Member Heather Strauss
The author of this book is neither a real estate agent or broker nor does she give any indication that she has sold her own home. Her expertise is freelance writing and helping others develop books. After reading the bio I wondered how good this book would really be.
The author did do research and does give much information for the first time seller of his or her own home. Being in real estate myself and selling many homes through an agent or on my own I felt that the information given is valuable and correct. I also feel that if the homeowner followed the suggestions, especially the staging aspects, that success could be achieved.
There are many aspects to consider when selling a home and I'm sure that after reading this book the seller will be able to decide if the savings of money selling the home oneself would outweigh the expertise of an agent.
I do recommend this book, not only for those contemplating selling their own home but those using a real estate agent. I'm sure you'd glean information that your agent didn't or isn't going to tell you.
Reviewed on 06/09/2011 by ReviewTheBook.com Member Irene Watson
