You Are Almost Home!

By Garrett Lund

Selling your home can be a daunting task if you don’t know where to begin. One of the keys to a successful home sale is finding the right agent to guide you through the process and ultimately ensure that you get the best price possible. When you’re looking for the right real estate agent to fit your needs, consider these 5 tips.

1.    Find an Experienced Agent

While this might seem like a no-brainer when it comes to choosing your listing agent, it is the cardinal rule in making your selection. Many agents may dabble in real estate part-time or think that they can make a quick buck by becoming an agent. The truth is, an experienced agent brings a wealth of knowledge to your home sale from previous experience such as knowing the history of sales in the neighborhood, what features attract the best types of buyers, and how long a home is typically on the market in your area. You don’t want to be a guinea pig while a green agent figures these things out.

2.    Passion About the Industry

In addition to ensuring your listing agent has the experience needed, you should be able to gauge their enthusiasm about real estate from simple conversations about the market. An engaged and passionate agent will provide an optimistic, but realistic, view of your local market, as well as how that compares to what’s happening nationally.

Why is this important? There are many agents out there who may have weathered the storm in the housing market in the last few years, but who feel burned out by the whole industry. Finding an agent who is excited as you are about finding the right buyer for your home, not only makes the process more pleasant for you, it ensures you that every possible avenue is being explored.  

3.    Familiarity with Your Neighborhood

Finding a real estate agent that is intimately familiar with your neighborhood is essential to successfully selling your home. Just having a sign in a neighboring yard doesn’t give that agent the knowledge they need to attract the right type of buyers. How many homes has the agent sold in your neighborhood recently? What do they see as the most marketable aspects of the neighborhood? Can they tell you about the HOA and school districts off the top of their heads? These are all indications of how intimately familiar the agent is with your area.

Another easy way to gauge their familiarity is having a look at their website and blog. Is your community featured prominently? How are they promoting your neighborhood overall?

Other questions to ask the agents are what organizations they are involved with in your community. Are they Chamber members? Do they serve on the board of local organizations such as educational or charitable foundations? The more involved your agent is with the community, the better reach they have in finding potential buyers that are right for you.

4.    A Variety of Channels to Market Your Home

In years past, real estate agents’ main channels of advertising relied on local newspapers or postcards. While these may still be effective in some cases, there are many, many more channels available to market your home to attract the best possible buyer.   

Not only should the agency incorporate the MLS feed into their own website, they should be optimizing that website to attract new visits from potential buyers. With over 90% of home searches beginning online today, your home needs to have great visibility on as many outlets as possible.

Leveraging social media channels is another very powerful way to market your home to the widest possible audience. Creating notices about open houses, new listings, and even community events keeps their audience engaged and informed about new opportunities.

Pro Tip: Does the agent create a video of your home to help make the sale? With online video being one of the most popular online activities, it is a huge advantage to have a virtual tour of your home available for buyers to view. Using quality video to showcase all that your home has to offer will only increase your chances of locating that perfect buyer.

5.    Provides References of Recent Clients

A qualified agent should be able to provide you with references from recent home sales in your area to give you an idea of what to expect. You can also take a look at their own social media profiles to see if they have positive feedback from recent clients.

Finding the right Real Estate Agent to help you through the process of selling your home is essential to having a successful sale. If you are in the North County San Diego area and are thinking about selling your home, give us a call and see if The Lund Team is a good fit for you.