Dawna Davies and her assistant Jodi Blanchard did an exceptional job in helping us sell our home in San Luis Obispo. Dawna’s intelligence and knowledge of the business made the whole complex process easy for us to understand and navigate. What seemed like counter-intuitive advice at the start—that we should be extremely thorough in discovering any possible problems with the forty year old house and present them in advance—turned out to streamline the final transaction by building trust in potential buyers and removing the possibility of unpleasant surprises and uncertainty for us. Her contacts with a wide range of local business people who carried out many preparatory operations quickly and economically offered another unique benefit. Her tact and amiability made our numerous interactions pleasant rather than wary. And Jodi’s work in converting the box full of documents from our files into a coherent house-maintenance-history binder meticulous and creative. From start to finish our involvement with Davies Company was personally as well as financially rewarding.
1. Ignore the increase in interest rates. Buyers will only be able to get the loan and rate that is available at any given time. Set up the timing for listing your property at a time that works best for you. If the property sells quickly, you may need to start your transition sooner than you expected and if you need a loan, you may be subject to the same market conditions.
2. Price slightly below the comparable sales. Buyers will be attracted to your price and may be willing to add additional cash or gifts to increase their offer so they can keep the loan amount/payments the same.
3. Consider what terms will be attractive to you, beyond price. In some cases buyers may be willing to let you stay in the property beyond closing, and/or pay some of your closing costs, among other concessions. This may be more affordable to a buyer than risking an increase in their interest rate or payment amount on a 30-year loan.
4. Do the math. To help determine the market for your property, calculate payments based on a conventional 30-year loan with 20% down. With this amount, figuring that the loan payment may be about 40% of a buyer’s monthly income, you will get an idea of the income level and lifestyle of a possible buyer. Often this is suprising to a seller.
5. Consider seller financing. If the property that you are selling has no current financing, this may be a beneficial option. If you put your cash after closing into a savings account, you may get a much lower rate of return than if a buyer is making payments to you at a current market interest rate.