The dangers and disadvantages of selling your property yourself

Discover the dangers and disadvantages of trying to sell your property yourself. See our tips and recommendations. 

Once you’ve decided to sell your property, you need to decide whether you want to sell it yourself or use a real estate broker. Some people decide to sell on their own, thinking they can save on commission. However, they don’t realize how challenging this can be.

In fact, there are several dangers and disadvantages to selling on your own.

1. A heavy workload

Putting your property up for sale is no easy task, and requires a lot of work.

In fact, there are several stages to go through when putting a property up for sale. When you sell on your own, you have to do everything yourself. You have to write your ad and manage the photos. The ad must be engaging, and the photos must be of high quality to encourage potential buyers to visit. You’ll then need to manage the calls and emails that come in. What’s more, you’ll also be the person responsible for carrying out viewings, which means you’ll need to be available at various times to welcome buyers. Finally, any negotiations will be at your expense. This requires skill and confidence, which not everyone has.

All these different stages represent hours and hours of work, which can be stressful and worrying. Working with a real estate broker lets you get away from it all and sell your property with complete peace of mind.

2. poor property valuation

An important step in the sale of a property is its appraisal. When you’re selling on your own, it’s sometimes very difficult to get the right price.

First of all, unlike a real estate broker, you don’t necessarily have the knowledge of the real estate market in your neighborhood, and it can be complicated to evaluate your property properly.

Secondly, there is a certain emotional attachment that can make it difficult to ask for a fair price. You’ve spent time there, you’ve seen your family grow up, you’re attached to it and you want to get the best price for it.

Finally, you may be in a situation where you sell to buy later. Your future project then depends on the amount of money you will receive from the sale of your property. So sometimes you want it for more than it’s worth.

However, overvaluing your property can have serious consequences on the sale. It can remain on the market without any activity.

3. you are restricted in your broadcasting modes.

In fact, when you’re selling on your own, you’re very limited as to where you can post your ad. Sure, you have access to free publishing platforms, but you certainly don’t have the marketing tools that a broker uses.

A real estate broker is present on social networks, has his own website and many other tools that enable him to give very high visibility to the properties he lists.

4. Poor preparation to welcome visitors

Once you’ve gone through all the stages of ad writing, photos, marketing and promotion, you need to move on to visitor management.

The major challenge is to make your property presentable to potential buyers. Sometimes, your property may need a few adjustments and modifications to appeal to the widest possible audience. It’s not always easy to see this for yourself, or to come up with the ideas to change things on a budget.

But there’s nothing worse than welcoming visitors to a home that’s untidy or where the lights don’t work…