buying home without realtor-save on closing costs

[amyy]

I am looking at buying a home that is for sale by owner. Will this help (or hurt) in terms of the closing costs.

thanks

 

[lovepurple]

This would not affect your closing costs as a buyer at all. The seller is saving realtor fees. You will still have to pay the usual closing costs, unless you can get the seller to agree to pay them.

 

[sameyeyam]

I would definitely see if you can get the seller to pay all closing costs, due to the fact that they are not having to pay a realtor commission. Generally the realtor commission runs 5-7% of the total cost of the house.

If they won't pick up the closing costs, then use it as a negotiating tool when you make an offer.

 

[lucigo]

While this probably sometimes works out great I wanted to share an experience we had just as a precaution. We were trying to buy a house for sale by owner and found out the day we were supposed to close that the people we were buying from didn't actually own the house, their father did, and he was in the middle of a bankrupsy...so no title insurance, no house. We had to unpack our bags and start looking all over again. I'm guessing there was a reason they hadn't listed with a realtor!

 

[java]

I sold a house without a realtor. The savings was passed along to the buyer- in that if I had to pay a 6% comission my price would have been at least 10% higher. But that's not what everyone does. You have to make sure you are getting a deal. Look at comprables in the neighborhood. See what houses have sold for.

Unfortunately there is a category of FSBO that think the value of the house is much greater than it really is. So you need to do a little more homework with one- but sometimes can get a good deal(Like my house was)

 

[Doodlebug939]

I am almost done buying my home.

I would never have gone into a home purchase without two things. One is the realtor that is a buyer broker and the other is the home inspector.

The realtor is paid on the sellers side and it doesnt cost you a dime to have a realtor yourself. If it is a FSBO that is a little different. And I am sure that there are wonderful people who sell there home on their own and cut the cost to the buyer. However, it is not something that I feel comfortable with because this was a totally new process for us. Our realtor knows what is the standard for the area. For example, closing costs. The area that we are buying in has a typical sellers assistance of around 3-4%. If I didnt use a realtor I would not have known that.

 

[4mickey2]

buying or selling a home by fsbo is not that hard. you can normally save a good amount of money by not using a realtor. you can speak to the owners who know the home rather than a sales person just trying to get cash flow.

if you feel uncomfortable about all the paperwork you need to sign you can always hire a lawyer to help you throuh the process. still a lot cheaper than a realtor... just my opinion.

 

[disneymom2003]

We bought our home from the owner. We did not have a realtor to represent us but.......we bought our home from a realtor. We felt very comfortable because she was well know in our town and we knew she could not stand bad publicity and we figured there was no way she was going to do something underhanded. Because we bought from her without a realtor she lowered the price of the house $18,000 and it was then in our budget And we were right. We also got a home inspection which revealed that the heating unit was bad and therefore red flagged. She had to replace it.

 

[Soon2B4]

I purchased my home using a realtor and it did cost ME money. The seller didn't agree to pay the 5-7% and only agreed to pay her realtor 3%. There was no co-broker fee set aside by her. I had to pay my realtor the 3% she charged on top of all my closing costs.

I SOLD my home without a realtor and like PP said, I had a lower sale price do to that fact. If I had to pay a realtor, I would have charged more to offset the cost.

 

[SarahKate]

If you have a buyer's agent picked out, they can call the owner of the house and ask if they work with agents and see what they would be willing to pay.

You don't HAVE to have an agent to purchase the home, but it can be to your advantage to have an expert on your side in making sure all details are attended to. You also want to watch out for the contract side of things - agents can use their realtor contracts which have been blessed by multiple attornies, whereas in a FSBO situation the contract might have been bought at OfficeMax or something - which can be a little scary. Some of these can be VERY one-sided.

As far as asking the seller to pay your closing costs, this varies from region to region. What is standard practice in one part of the country doesn't apply to others.

When we sold our house, our buyer wanted us to pay closing. But that's not standard practice in our area so we NIXED it - the contract they had presented to us was from a friend of theirs in Chicago who was an attorney.

 

[parklandgroupoh]

It will really depend on the arrangement they have with the realtor. It is not always a open and shut case when it comes to these things and remember that you will always, always have some sort of negotiating power. Dealing with professionals will also assure you that everything with the zoning and other paperwork will usually be taken care of. I always get good advice from this Columbus real estate agent who really knows her stuff. She has helped me make good deals over the years.

 

[dyna]

We bought our home with out a realtor bought it sight unseen off of mhvillage.com. Just moved in last week an we could not be happier. We paid cashe for the home before we ever saw it, withiut knowing the area it in....got the home so cheap that it did not matter we knew we'd get our money back by selling it if we not happy.

My DD also sold her home without a realtor sold it on craigs list and bought my house without realtor. Buying my house she pretty much knew what she was getting tho....

As I found out years ago just because you got a realtor does not mean sale of home is going to go smoothly an trouble free