Does it really cost $60k to sell a house?

[Anonymous]

I’ve never used a realtor to sell a home. I hired an attorney and paid him $3k. Paid a stager. Painted the whole house. Paid a photographer and listed myself.

Buyers had to pay their own realtor. I’ve done this twice and always got the purchase price I wanted.

Realtors are a waste of money in a hot market with turnover.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've been advised in the past to estimate 10% of the sale price in transaction costs -- a combination of realtor fees, closing fees, any prep to get the house ready to sell, and moving costs. The last 2 moves I had ended up around 8%, so I came out slightly ahead of my planned reserves.

I think that's a good estimate up to around the $1M mark. When you have a $5M house on the market, it won't cost $500k to sell it unless you haven't done work on it over the years and need a renovation to sell.

[Anonymous]

An agent has entered the chat.

Question, how much does an agent have to pay their “boss” or company?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:An agent has entered the chat.

Question, how much does an agent have to pay their “boss” or company?

NP not PP but it depends on the agent and the agency. For a new agent at a full service brokerage it can be half.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hope that by the time we need to sell the realtor profession will be made obsolete or have lots of competition that drives the commission way down. They don't deserve more than 1-2% max

You’re free to sell it on your own whenever you want so that it will make no difference to you whether realtors are charging 1% or 10%.

But, no, you’ll hire a realtor because you’re too lazy to learn and do everything needed to sell a house for the highest profit — and then you’ll just whine about how expensive it was.

I’m not a realtor so I have no skin in that game. But I am a salesperson in another industry, and it’s amazing that some people think there are undue profits in sales jobs especially considering that commissioned sales positions, in particular, have something like a 95% failure/turnover rate.

Getting paid $40,000 for 'selling' a house the buyers found on their own and brought the needed funds to.....is a joke.

[Anonymous]

Back in the day, I remember our real estate driving us around to different houses, letting us in the door, and late night negotiating sessions.

Now you can just check out Redfin listings and go to the open houses.

[Anonymous]

No way. That seems very high.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’ve never used a realtor to sell a home. I hired an attorney and paid him $3k. Paid a stager. Painted the whole house. Paid a photographer and listed myself.

Buyers had to pay their own realtor. I’ve done this twice and always got the purchase price I wanted.

Realtors are a waste of money in a hot market with turnover.

Wouldnt be so proud about getting purchase price.

[Anonymous]

for agent fees and the value they bring - really depends on the market and how desirable the property is.

We used redfin to sell our townhouse inside the beltway. They only charge 1.5% seller, we did 2.5% buyer, so 4% total. Minimal fixup prior - basically just patched holes in the walls where things were hanging. No staging. Agent had us list it a little higher than I would have, full price offer no contingencies on day 1. This was during the pandemic though.

At the end, the total closing costs were about half of what I estimated (thought it would be around 60k, ended up closer to 30k), but its never horrible to overestimate

[Anonymous]

I agree that agent fees should NOT be a percentage of the sales price - my agent + broker made $50K in helping us buy and sell our home. I will say that we were out looking at houses with her once or twice a week for four months, so she definitely earned her buying commission, but our old home was under contract in three days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’ve never used a realtor to sell a home. I hired an attorney and paid him $3k. Paid a stager. Painted the whole house. Paid a photographer and listed myself.

Buyers had to pay their own realtor. I’ve done this twice and always got the purchase price I wanted.

Realtors are a waste of money in a hot market with turnover.

Clearly you're talking about a low value house. This DIY slap a fresh coat of paint doesn't work beyond a certain price point.

[Anonymous]

I can top that - realtors wanted 250,000.00 to sell a house for me during the last recession.

I asked them for their marketing plans.

One showed me ads that were literally the size of a postage stamp.

When I questioned who could actually read the text in the ad, they said it was better because they would really have to be interested if they read the ad.

Can’t make this sh$t up.

Another one wanted me to finish the basement (3000 + sq. ft.) - complete with theater and add a pool. Estimated costs exceeded $550,000.00.

One realty firm decided not to show my house once I listed it because I didn’t use their firm.

I believe a knowledgeable local realtor can add tremendous value and help you understand the local area and where you should focus your efforts.

But the industry has a whole needs rampant change.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’ve never used a realtor to sell a home. I hired an attorney and paid him $3k. Paid a stager. Painted the whole house. Paid a photographer and listed myself.

Buyers had to pay their own realtor. I’ve done this twice and always got the purchase price I wanted.

Realtors are a waste of money in a hot market with turnover.

My father was investor and he preached this to me throughout my childhood. He would say, "what's the point in getting an agent, I have a lawyer". Now that I am an investor, I've sold houses on my own and used an agent. Houses sell themselves in this area and if you have a good house, it will sell fast once you put it on the MLS.

[Anonymous]

The recordation taxes/fees in DC are also really high and add to this. We paid over 40K when we bought our house.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:for agent fees and the value they bring - really depends on the market and how desirable the property is.

We used redfin to sell our townhouse inside the beltway. They only charge 1.5% seller, we did 2.5% buyer, so 4% total. Minimal fixup prior - basically just patched holes in the walls where things were hanging. No staging. Agent had us list it a little higher than I would have, full price offer no contingencies on day 1. This was during the pandemic though.

At the end, the total closing costs were about half of what I estimated (thought it would be around 60k, ended up closer to 30k), but its never horrible to overestimate

When did Redfin switch back to fixed % listing fee, and lower it to 1.5%