commission

You’ve been told before that selling your home “for sale by owner” or FSBO is a bad idea in a down market. So now that markets have improved, is it a better time to do so now? No, the same issues exist with FSBO in any market.

The Tampa market has definitely improved

That may mean some people think that it would be a good time to sell their homes themselves. They would be wrong.

The same reasons that make it a bad idea to sell FSBO in a down market are still the same in a good one. Do you have the time it takes to successfully market your home, hold open houses and make sure Realtors in the area are aware of your home for sale? Probably not.

Another of those reasons is especially important in this area: your listing not being seen by people from out of town. A lot of people looking for homes in this area are looking from out of the area. If they do see it somehow, their Realtor will be more likely to hesitate to work with a homeowner selling themselves.

“Save” the commission

Thinking that you will “save” the commission selling yourself, think again. The statistical reality is that you will get substantially less for the sale of your home.

According to a 2020 NAR Survey, the median selling price for a home sold with the assistance of a Realtor was $295,000 but the median sale for all FSBO homes was $217,000 last year.

So let’s do some math. The average commission is 6%. That means a home selling for the median, $249,000, would mean a commission of $14,940. The difference in the median Realtor assisted sale and the FSBO sale in the best circumstance is $39,000 and under the usual it goes to $97,100. The commission number is substantially lower than the difference in selling prices.

Find a Realtor instead of selling yourself. Your bank account will thank you.

If you’ve sold real estate you know that you pay a commission to your listing agent. But who pays the commission to the buyer’s agent? It can depend, but usually the seller. Here’s the low down on how to figure out who pays.

The easiest to understand is this, a listing agent works for the seller and the seller pays their commission. An agent must work for a real estate broker and the broker is the only one authorized to enter into a listing agreement. Think of it like the agent works for a company. The commissions are paid to the company and the agent gets paid by the company. Of course, that makes little difference to what is paid by whom. Generally, the seller pays all of the commissions.

A seller’s agent is someone hired by the home seller to assist with selling their home. The homeowner signs an agreement called a listing agreement. That agreement means that the broker has the exclusive right to list the home for a specific amount of time for a specific percentage of the sales price of the home.

A buyer’s agent works with people looking to buy a home. There is usually no written agreement, and the buyer’s agent shares the commission paid for the sale of the home with the listing agent. How the commission is divided will depend on several things. First, if both agents are in the same brokerage, the broker figures the split. If not, there really aren’t rules, but the listing agent will come out with a higher percentage of the commission than the seller.

What doesn’t change is who pays the commission. That is almost always the seller. Now, that’s not to say it can’t become part of any negotiations, but normally the seller pays it all.
Why? Because the commission is generally included in the sale price of the house. At the closing, payments will be made out of the funds from the sale for various things, including the commission.

So, if you’re the seller, you’re the paying party.

Is This A Good Market To Sell FSBO

Why Real Estate Buyers Pay No Commission!

The Deb Ward Team