Home Repairs
If you’re thinking about selling your home, it’s likely there are things you could do to enhance the appeal of your place and potentially raise its value. If you’ve been putting off sprucing up the exterior of your property, painting the inside or repairing a staircase or a leaky faucet, now’s the time to make those changes. Before the home gets listed you may incur some expenses to get it ready for the market. Fresh paint may cost a few hundred or a few thousand. Landscaping and other repairs may come into play as well and require substantial investments depending on what needs to be done.
Staging Costs
What will it take to make your home appeal to potential buyers? If you were selling 30 years ago, tidying up and painting would probably have been enough. Today, if you look at real estate listings, you’ll see that sellers do a lot more. Painting, yes, but also moving out most of your furniture and even renting art. The cost can range from several hundred to several thousand dollars, depending on how much fixing up your place needs. You may be able to save by doing the staging yourself. But prepare to pay for things like storage space. Some real estate agents provide staging as part of their services.
Home Inspector Pre-Inspection Reports
Sometimes Sellers have their house inspected prior to putting it on the market. This report can give assurance to buyers contemplating submitting an offer on the property. Pre-inspection reports tend to be priced in the four to six hundred dollar range. Your Realtor can advise you whether or not to get a pre-inspection report.
Early Discharge of Mortgage Penalty
If you have to discharge your mortgage upon completion of your sale, you may incur a discharge penalty from the mortgagee to do this. Talk to your mortgage broker or bank to find out what these costs may be. Even open mortgages can incur a processing fee to be discharged.
Moving Costs
It is difficult to estimate how much one should budget for this, as there are so many factors to consider. Moving costs can run from hundreds to thousands of dollars. Your bill will depend on where you’re moving and how much stuff you have to shift. That is, of course, unless you have your own truck and friends who will work for pizza and beer.
Real Estate Brokerage Fees
Most Realtor fees are based upon the selling price of the property. The real estate commission is usually the biggest fee a seller pays — 5 percent to 6 percent of the sale price.
