A Step-by-Step First Time Seller's Guide

Putting your home on the market can be a stressful process, especially when you don’t know what to expect. Fortunately, with the help of an experienced team of real estate agents and this easy to follow guide, you can smoothly complete the process. Following these steps will help you prepare so you can get organized and sell your home for the best price possible.

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Step 1: Understand Why You're Selling

What do you want to accomplish with the sale of your home? Do you want to make a certain amount of money that you can put toward a larger or nicer home? Do you need to sell it as soon as possible to facilitate a move to a new city or area? Once you understand your needs, you can better craft your offer. For example, if you need to sell quickly, you might want to price your home lower than if your goal is to make a certain profit margin. Make sure you convey these needs to your team of real estate agents once you choose one so they can adjust your selling price accordingly.

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Step 2: Determine Selling Price

Knowing how to price your home is one of the most important parts of the selling process. When you set a fair price in the beginning, you’ll get the most interest from other real estate agents and prospective buyers. Overpricing your home could lead to reduced interest, and underpricing leads to receiving less than what your home is worth. Working with a team of real estate agent is the best way to determine the right selling price for your home. A team of real estate agent with experience can determine what other comparable homes are selling for, evaluate the current market, and may even suggest a home appraisal.

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Step 3: Start Preparations

If you’ve kept your home in showroom condition since you’ve lived in it, you’re in the minority of homeowners. Once you price your home, it’s time to start getting it ready to be shown to potential buyers. This includes getting rid of clutter, depersonalizing the space so that buyers can envision themselves in the space, making any small repairs, and doing a deep clean to make sure your home is in pristine condition.

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Step 4: Develop a Marketing Strategy

We will develop a marketing strategy that is perfect for advertising your home. This involves listing the home and then driving the right people to that listing through social media campaigns, agent-to-agent referrals, traditional media, or SEO advertising. Our team creates a marketing campaign that aims to get the most possible traffic to your listing in the first three weeks after becoming a client.

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Step 5: Evaluate Offers

Receiving an offer is an exciting part of the process, but it doesn’t mean the journey is over. We will evaluate each offer and make sure the party making the offer is prequalified or pre-approved by a mortgage lender and that their offer is acceptable to you. If the offer is too low, you can make a counter-offer or offer other ways to bridge the gap, such as covering some or all of the closing costs, making repairs, adjusting the move-in date, or leaving some appliances or fixtures for the new buyer.

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Step 6: Accept an Offer

Once we deem the offer is acceptable, we will review the proposed contract to make sure it’s all in order and includes the necessary components such as deposit amount, down payment, financing, inspection rights and repair allowances, contingencies, settlement date, and a list of fees and who will pay them. When both parties have agreed to the term, a final contract will be prepared by your team of real estate agents.

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Step 7: Get Ready to Close

You have accepted an offer and are now very close to the end of your selling journey. But first, you and the buyer must make a list of what needs to be done before closing. In some cases, your home may need to be formally inspected, surveyed, and appraised. In other cases, major or minor repairs will need to be made before the house can close. We will head up efforts to develop and execute this list, get each action item paid for by the correct party, and make sure everything is in order by the closing date. A few days before the closing date, we will call the company closing the transaction to make sure everything is ready to go. If you haven’t done so already, you also need to make arrangements to move out of the home so the new buyer can take possession.

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Step 8: Close

You’ve reached the last step in the seller’s process. When you close on a home you are selling, you are legally transferring ownership of the property to the new buyer. We will meet with the company closing the transaction to sign the final paperwork and go over any issues that have not yet been taken care of. During this time, you can also make plans with your team of real estate agents to handle final details such as canceling utilities, cable, and lawn or trash services, changing the name on accounts that the new owner is retaining and ensuring the new owner has instructions for all appliances that will remain in the home.

Congratulations!

Once you have sold your home, you’re free to take the next step on your journey. Whether this is relocating to a new city, moving into a larger home, or downsizing and enjoying your life as empty-nesters, knowing all your selling responsibilities have been taken care of will help you achieve peace of mind for your new path.

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY

Cathy and Ilies were fast and diligent, made themselves available, and followed up with potential buyers. It was an impressive start for us and we are looking forward to many more sales.

— Bya & Rick

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY

Thank you so much for the thoughtful gift. What a surprise to have an incredible wine and a treat from our favorite bakery delivered right to our door! Please thank Ilies for us as well. You two are a great team and made our buying experience in Park City a wonderful success. Thank you again! Happy Holidays to you and yours.

— Rodney & Dee

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY

I have never dealt with a real estate agent as knowledgeable, savvy, and attentive to marketing a property and closing the sale as Cathy Richards and her colleagues at Engel & Volkers in Park City, UT. She and her team were terrific in every respect, and in my view, earned every penny of the commission they received on the sale. If I were selling another property in the Park City, Utah, area, I would con...

— A. S.

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY

Our buying process involved 5 different properties. The first four fell by the wayside for a variety of reasons but Cathy and Ilies kept on looking on our behalf and keeping us up to date as needed even when away on vacation. We lived over 1900 miles away in South Carolina and needed someone who could represent us. I don't think we could have found anyone better!

— Jan & Ted V.

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY

Cathy is great at her job! She helped us with the purchase of a home and also a sale. Her listing was so great that our place sold while 4 others in the same complex are still for sale.

— Tom

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY

Cathy is awesome. We were relocated to Texas and she helped us sell our home quickly and for more than we expected. She and her partner Ilies had the house listed in just a few days, and our home had 2 offers a few days later. They helped us select the strongest offer and worked with our relocation company to close the deal. We highly recommend Cathy and Ilies. We couldn't be happier.

— Tom A.

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY

Cathy was very professional and was able to sell our property in less than 24 hours. She knows the local market extremely well and was a pleasure to work with. I would highly recommend Cathy for any of your real estate needs.

— Seller

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY

Cathy Richards is a wonderful agent with deep knowledge of the local market! She has excellent communication skills and manages the sales process very effectively! I highly recommend her as a local real estate agent.

— Valentin A.

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY

Cathy is very experienced and wonderful to work with. She really knows Park City, the Basin, and surrounding communities such as Heber City and Midway. Cathy was happy to spend time helping us get a sense of the neighborhoods where we saw homes of interest. She was very thorough when it came to marketing our home and selling it in under 30 days. I highly recommend her and her team.

— Buyer

WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY

Cathy Richards is a fantastic real estate agent. I worked with her to buy a property sight unseen while I was in a different part of the country. I had to rely on her local knowledge and ethics substantially - she steered me (thankfully) away from a property that would not have been a good investment, and helped me find a fantastic property that exceeded my expectations when I finally made it out there t...

— Julie

Work With Us

Cathy & Ilies are dedicated to helping you find your dream home and assisting with any selling needs you may have. Contact us today to start your home searching journey!