Selling a Home is a Financial Decision

Want to Increase Your Equity When Selling Your Home? - Think of your home as a financial asset.

A transition takes place when you begin the process of selling your home. You see your home not as a home, but as a financial asset, and the question becomes how do your get the most equity out of your house?

This one piece of advice will make all your home selling decisions come into sharp perspective. When selling a home, the biggest reason that a home doesn't sell at the best price on the market, or within a reasonable timeframe, or with equitable terms, is because of this one simple decision isn't made by the seller(s).

Your first decision when you decide to sell your home is to separate yourself from the personal feelings you have about the house. Often when you talk with realtors about buying real estate, we'll refer to your new property as a "home." When you sell a property, we'll often refer to your property as a house. While buying a home is often an emotional decision, selling a house is a financial decision, one for which emotional detachment is needed. Potential home buyers don't care and don't want to know about the memories, or sentimental attachment you have in your home. In fact, the best way to sell your home is to make it seem like you don't live there. More about that in the next section.

When you decide to sell your home, resolve to yourself that your home no longer belongs to you. When you think of your house as another financial transaction such as a currency trade or a commodity trade, you think more clearly about all the decisions you need to make before you close on escrow. Buyers on the other hand invest emotion into the purchase of their new home and it is in your best financial interest to do everything possible to allow them to see your house as their new home. The downside to not detaching yourself emotionally from selling your house is that the process becomes more difficult for you, and at times, unconsciously, you can either drive potential buyers away, reduce to opportunity for all potential buyers to see your house or unintentionally create other situations that take it longer than need be to sell your house.

When you do finally make the decision to sell, you have the house ready, hired the best realtor in town and have found your next home. Try to think of yourself as a buyer of your own house. Now keep in mind that you have lived there and probably do have some emotional ties to the house and neighborhood. The big questions is “Would you buy this house for what you are asking?” Every time you get an offer to purchase your house, you have 2 competing buyers, the person presenting an offer and you. Think that if you and the other buyer were both competing for your house, would you outbid them? If the answer is no, it’s time to reassess the asking price of your home.

When selling a product of any type, there are a lot of variables involved. It’s always best to make sure one of the factors as a seller is not emotions.