Do "empty" houses sell faster?

[Lisa F]

C.Ann, I suggest you talk to a good RE Attorney. You're not "doing that to someone." That's just the way it is in NY. In fact, I'm learning that it totally sucks to be a buyer in NY. You're not trying to put something over on someone, you're protecting yourself from being sued (which is what you worried about). I'm not saying you have to try to pass your house off as perfect, just that there is a mechanism in place that as far as I know EVERYONE takes advantage of to keep you from being sued (which you indicated you were worried about).

You will sell the house "as is" and anyone with half a brain will get a good house inspector to let them know what "as is" means. This will probably be a report of about 25 pages or so that will list things that NEED to be fixed, things that should be fixed eventually and things that have a high probability of breaking in the near future (say a really old water heater or something).

In either case, you need to really figure out what your responsibilities are so that you are not worrying about things that are NOT your responsibility. I'm not suggesting that you try to HIDE anything, just that you cut yourself some slack and let the buyers decide if they want a fixer that needs updating, the inspectors do their job and figure out how much work your house needs and the attorneys, who will make sure that their clients (both the buyer AND the seller) are protected. It sounds like you have enough on your plate without having to be the buyer, inspector and attorney on top of dealing with your own health and your family.

People sell fixer uppers all the time and young couples without a lot of money but with sweat to turn into equity love them. Just keep your house neat and uncluttered, that's really the advice that ALL realtors give. Talk to a realtor about doing a current market analysis and come up with a fair price for a house that is a fixer upper (a good rule of thumb is the price of comparable houses in good condition minus the cost to fix it up). The spring through summer is the best time for selling houses as the most people are looking. If you price your house fairly (even competitively), be honest about it by listing it "as is" (that is usually a clue to buyers that this house is not going to be in tip top condition) and get a good attorney, you will be fine.

Again, I'm sorry you have to deal with this at all but good luck. We are househunting and it has been just awful, but your situation sure puts things into perspective.

 

[Randi]

Tough situation to be in, I wish you the very best outcome. One thing I did want to mention is that your homeowners insurance may balk at insuring an empty house. I ran into that when I sold my grandfather's house. They gave me quite a hassle about vandalism, and breakins with a vacant house. Does your DD live in the same city as you so she could check on the house frequently?
Good luck and God Bless.

 

[C.Ann]

Originally posted by Lisa F
C.Ann, I suggest you talk to a good RE Attorney. You're not "doing that to someone." That's just the way it is in NY. In fact, I'm learning that it totally sucks to be a buyer in NY. You're not trying to put something over on someone, you're protecting yourself from being sued (which is what you worried about). I'm not saying you have to try to pass your house off as perfect, just that there is a mechanism in place that as far as I know EVERYONE takes advantage of to keep you from being sued (which you indicated you were worried about).

You will sell the house "as is" and anyone with half a brain will get a good house inspector to let them know what "as is" means. This will probably be a report of about 25 pages or so that will list things that NEED to be fixed, things that should be fixed eventually and things that have a high probability of breaking in the near future (say a really old water heater or something).

In either case, you need to really figure out what your responsibilities are so that you are not worrying about things that are NOT your responsibility. I'm not suggesting that you try to HIDE anything, just that you cut yourself some slack and let the buyers decide if they want a fixer that needs updating, the inspectors do their job and figure out how much work your house needs and the attorneys, who will make sure that their clients (both the buyer AND the seller) are protected. It sounds like you have enough on your plate without having to be the buyer, inspector and attorney on top of dealing with your own health and your family.

People sell fixer uppers all the time and young couples without a lot of money but with sweat to turn into equity love them. Just keep your house neat and uncluttered, that's really the advice that ALL realtors give. Talk to a realtor about doing a current market analysis and come up with a fair price for a house that is a fixer upper (a good rule of thumb is the price of comparable houses in good condition minus the cost to fix it up). The spring through summer is the best time for selling houses as the most people are looking. If you price your house fairly (even competitively), be honest about it by listing it "as is" (that is usually a clue to buyers that this house is not going to be in tip top condition) and get a good attorney, you will be fine.

Again, I'm sorry you have to deal with this at all but good luck. We are househunting and it has been just awful, but your situation sure puts things into perspective.

--------
----------------------------------

Thanks so much, LisaF.. Obviously I thought it was a way of "covering up" things and I wasn't keen on that idea at all.. I appreciate you taking the time to explain all of that and I will certainly check into those matters.. As I said earlier, I just want to be fair to any prospective buyers and of course protect myself at the same time.. You seem to know a lot about this - based on your own search for a home - so could you share some of the problems you have run into? I've never sold a home before - and when I purchased this home it was from my parents so obviously I never needed to go through having inspections done or anything of that nature..

I have a feeling that as soon as we have a couple of weeks of warm weather there is going to be a glut of houses up on the market so when my DD and her DH find a house that's suitable for all of us I need to be able to get the ball rolling as soon as possible.. That's why I'm trying to figure out what I can do right now to cut down on rushing around like a chicken with my head cut off later on.. I really, really DO appreciate all you have offered here and if you have anything more to say, I'd love to hear it!

Thanks!

 

[C.Ann]

Originally posted by Randi
Tough situation to be in, I wish you the very best outcome. One thing I did want to mention is that your homeowners insurance may balk at insuring an empty house. I ran into that when I sold my grandfather's house. They gave me quite a hassle about vandalism, and breakins with a vacant house. Does your DD live in the same city as you so she could check on the house frequently?
Good luck and God Bless.

----------------------------------------------------------

Interesting you should mention the insurance aspect because last fall when I was toying with the idea of moving in with my DD & her DH I had called my homeowner's/car insurance company to see what it would cost to drop the policy here (if we moved) and just keep the policy up to the lake.. They explained that they normally don't do that (because the lake house is empty approx. 5 to 6 months out of the year) but because we had been customers with them for over 25 years they would maintain the insurance on the lake house in exchange for us purchasing a very reasonable "renter's insurance policy" to cover our belongings in my DD's house..

Although my DD doesn't live in the same city, she's only about 25 miles away and works less than 10 minutes from here.. Luckily we live in a neighborhood where vandalism has never been a problem (knock on wood), we're in a suburban area on a dead-end street, and my next-door neighbor has said that she and her husband would be more than happy to keep an eye on the place for us "just in case"..

These are all very important issues that everyone is bringing up and I certainly do appreciate all of the advice.. As stated above, I've never done anything like this before so I really appreciate any and all advice that is being offered..

 

[Uncleromulus]

I wish you the best as you deal with the health problems--.
AS for the house==neat and furnished seems best. When we sold our last home we were often there when folks came to look. You'd be amazed at how often they didn't even look too hard at the house itself--but at OUR furniture, table settings, curtains, etc.
Now I'd be looking at the heating sysyem, windows, plumbing etc, but very few of fthe people we saw even bothered!!

 

[PamOKW]

Terribly sorry to hear that you are facing some on-going health issues. If you haven't done so already, now would be a good time to check with an elder care lawyer (don't let the title put you off) and be sure you have everything in order for your husband and yourself. You'll want to make sure you have power-of-attorney, medical instructions, medical health care proxy a will and arrangements for handling the proceeds from your home sale all in order for your situation.

 

[DVC-Don]

We had 2 townhouses as rental properties for a while. When we put them up for sale one tennant had just moved out and one was occupied. The empty townhouse sold in a couple of weeks and the other took about 3 months. They were only 2 doors apart. Sold them without a realtor. Good luck.

 

[tkd lisa]

We've had to sell an empty house. When we moved from Indiana to Maryland due to base closure, our house in IN sat vacant from May through Dec. We had had it listed while living in it from Mar - May. While we were gone, I originally had the water turned off (afraid that something would be left running, pipe would break, etc.) The realtor said that was a bad idea, and we had it turned back on, and just had our in-laws swing by every few days to verify nothing bad was happening. I do think it was harder to sell because it was completely empty. If I had it to do again (and if had been possible), I would have left basic furniture there while we were moved away. It sounds like you could do that.

The insurance was a major pain. Basically they wanted 4 times the regular price because no one was living there. We argued with them and lost. If your house is minimally furnished, is there a young family member who would be willing to live there for free? If we had had furniture in ours, my youngest brother in law would have loved to stay there and I would have been happy to have him there, just for the insurance break.

 

[DMRick]

I think in NYS, you can pay a $500 fee at closing in exchange for not being held legally responsible for disclosing ANYTHING about your property.

Having just sold a home for our ward (she went into a nursing home), I found out the true meaning of "as is" means diddly. They usually get an engineering structure report, and then that's where the bargining comes in. We had to replace the septic for $4,000..on a house I thought we put on the market for a give away price, in a top school district. However, no bank would give a loan with such a major problem. You also, in NYS have to fill out a disclosure notice..gee whiz, if the house didn't have all these things wrong with it, the price would have been higher.

So C.Ann..don't price too low..leave yourself some wiggle room for bargining, because if the house needs those things fixed, they will want to bargain, no matter how cheap you make it.

 

[Lisa F]

Sorry I didn't get back to this sooner. My parents just (in the last 6 months) sold their house in NYC and bought a house in "the country" (I put it in quotes because it's not really the country, just feels that way to us city mice) in Putnam County, NY and we are househunting as well so I'm pretty familiar with the whole process, especially as it pertains to NY.

I think in NYS, it's only been recent that anyone even had to fill out any kind of a disclosure at all. I suppose some people use the $500 credit as a way to "cover things up" but for the most part, it's very possible for something to go wrong that you just didn't know about (or bad timing). Unless you really know what you are doing and looking at yourself, you'd be stupid to NOT hire an inspector as a buyer. I think most of the time the inspector finds things that the seller didn't even realize were wrong with their house. This can cause a lot of anxiety for buyers, especially first time buyers, who might see the inspection as a laundry list of things the seller must do to put the house in perfect condition.

As a seller you should realize that you are under NO obligation to sell a house in perfect condition and if you are not wanting to play games with that, just be up front about it with your listing agent. If your house is priced accordingly and fairly for the condition that it is in, don't feel bad about sticking to your guns about not messing with inspection issues (unless it's a large dealbreaker issue). It sounds like you have no fantasies about what your house might be worth and realize that it needs updating (it seems like many people think their house is worth more than it is without realizing that new kitchens and baths and other updates can count a lot in the value of a house), so you will probably be a dream to work with for a realtor.

In order to get the ball rolling I think you should have some realtors do a CMA for you (current market analysis). Interview them for the job, find out what they will do to market your house and ask them what you can do to prepare your house for the market. They should be able to give you specific advice since they deal with buyers on a daily basis and know what major turn offs can be. Be up front with them that you are shopping around for a realtor with the intention of putting your house on the market in a month or two, this way when you are ready to do so, you will have all of your ducks in a row.

I don't know what is customary in your area but at least in ours, many realtors will now list for "only" 5% commission (2.5% to listing and 2.5% to buyer's agents). It doesn't hurt to ask, oftentimes realtors won't offer. You may also want to work out a deal for lower commission if the realtor sells the house themselves since they will get to keep all of the commission. My parents did that and ended up only paying 4% commission since their realtor got to keep the entire thing. This might also give them incentive to market your house a bit more aggressively.

The prime selling season is pretty much from beginning of April to end of July. The weather is nicest and people with kids have a chance to get closed and moved in before the school year starts. There will be the most houses on the market at this time but in general it seems that part of what is fueling the hot market in certain areas of the country (and I saw in another post of yours that it seems like your area is pretty hot too, assuming you live near your daughter) is that there are more buyers than sellers. I would not look at a "glut" of housing on the market as a bad thing. Interest rates are still low and it seems there is not enough supply to meet the demand.

As far as problems I've run into, you are WAY more protected as a seller than as a buyer. Besides the $500 credit at closing in exchange for not having to disclose anything aspect, at least in our area of NY, no one will go to contract until the house has been inspected and any issues hashed out. What this means is that a buyer can spend over $1k for an inspection, appraisal, and mortgage app and the seller can just change their mind and sell to someone else without any recourse for the buyer. It makes things very nerve wracking for the buyer until you are actually under contract. As a seller, you basically just need to sit back and deal with the offers. I think more reputable realtors will nudge a seller into only entertaining other offers as a backup but LEGALLY they don't have to do that. My guess is that you will not be the kind of person who undermines an offer that buyers have already put money into.

Anyway, I hope that is helpful and that things go as painlessly as possible. Definately get a realtor (or a few) in to tell you what to do to your house to make it show better. They are professionals (well, most of them are) and that's what they do!

 

[C.Ann]

Thanks for all the additional info here!

Last night I did some research and found a home not far from me that is being sold "As Is" - same school district, but on a busy highway (not a residential dead-end street like mine). It only has 2 bedrooms (mine has 4), a crawl space (mine has a full basement), a falling down 1-car wooden garage (mine has a 2-car block detached garage), etc. It's listed for $20,000 more than I thought I could get for this place! Now obviously that doesn't mean it will SELL for that price, but I know now that I should probably "adjust" my thinking a bit..

I will definitely speak to several realtors (try to find the one that will do a good job AND charge a lower commission) and I will definitely have to leave lots of "wiggle" room - as DMRick pointed out - because I can't deal with any major repairs, etc - it will just have to be whacked off the price of the house..

Also - about the elder law attorney, etc. My DH & I already have wills, power-of-attorney, etc, and what papers need to be filed are already filed with the county. I do have to check into our summer place though as I think it may be time to pass it on to my granddaughter.. Also, after the very sudden death of my sister's DH last week, I've begun to check with funeral homes about pre-planning.. While my DH & I have already decided on cremation, I think the time has come to get much more specific information..

It's amazing how things can change so quickly - isn't it? I'm just glad I have a place like this where I can come to ask questions and receive all sorts of helpful info..

Thanks!

 

[Antonia]

I have a co-worker here in South Carolina who has an empty house and if it burns to the ground her insurance won't pay - so I would find out everything you can about having an empty house before you make any decisions.

 

[C.Ann]

Thanks for that info..

It's looking now like I might move my DH out first (to eliminate the medical equipment) and I would stay here "part-time".. There's a clause in my homeowner's somewhere that indicates how many days per week or month someone has to be living in the house so I'll have to dig it out and see exactly what it is..