What to Do If You Are Relocating and Can’t Sell Your House

When James Moreland (my husband) and I, Amanda, placed our first home on the market last fall, we tried all we could to make the Knoxville, Tennessee, 2-bedroom townhouse look as attractive to buyers as we possibly could. We really needed to sell the house fast since I had to relocate for work on August.

We took great photos of the house with the help of a professional photographer friend, searched online for furniture staging ideas, and even created a blog to help get the word out through social networks that our house was on sale. We even hired a realtor.

Due to the fact that we were placing our house on sale immediately after spring – the prime real estate season – and that the First-Time Homebuyer Tax Credit had just expired a couple of months earlier, we had faith that we would sell the house in a just a couple of months at most, but boy we were wrong.

Seven months later, we were still at it, informing potential buyers about upgrades we had made like updating the bathroom, crown molding, and oak laminate floors with no luck. Eventually, we turned to a Plan B; we kept the home listed for sale, and posted it for rent to see which Domino falls first.

Now here is my point, for discouraged homeowners like us, making a sale may appear impossible in the post 2008 housing market crises. For example, in January, there were more than 2.43 million homes on sale, according to date from Nationals Association of Realtors. But that was much better, in 2009, one year later; the association reported that 3.49 million homes were on sale.

Finally in June 2011, we were able to sell our home, but only for a price almost $25,000 less than we were expecting to get from the home. This is a common problem for families seeking to relocate. Even after the housing crash, selling a house fast is not an easy part of relocation. Fortunately, there are a couple of options homeowners seeking to relocate but can’t sell a house first can choose from.

Price It Right

“Understanding and knowing how to price your property is the most essential step for anyone eager to sell a house,” says Block Norman, a real estate agent in Raleigh-Durham city of North Carolina. You should research several listing services, compare equivalent properties and come up with a fair market price. In the current overcrowded housing market, an overpriced home won’t stand any chance of a showing.” tells Block.

Unfortunately, the right price might be lower than what you paid for the home especially if you had bought it somewhere between 2005 and 2008. Pricing the house lower than the market price might help you to land a buyer faster – you may even have to sell your house for what you owe, especially if you really need to load it off. For example, after all the hard time we had gone through trying to sell our home, we felt happy to sell it for a mere $6,000 over our original purchase price. This is despite having made improvements that ended costing us $8,000.

Ideally work with your agent to come up with the best price that does not place you out of the market. But remember, if you are not ready to sell your house for less than you paid for it, you are not out of options yet.

Spruce It Up

“Put yourself in the mindset of a buyer when making home improvements,” tells Block, the realtor who helped us sell the home and an adjunct professor of real estate at the University of North Carolina Kenan-Flagler Business Department. Add new hardware to the front door, a fresh coat of paint, de-clutter the front yard and trim bushes so that on overall, you yield a better first impression.

“Once inside your home,” Block tells, “Buys tend to look up more than down. Fix cracks and ensure light fixtures throughout your home are clean. If everything is sparkling and shining, the subconscious feeling in your potential buyer will be, “Wow! This house is well maintained and taken care of”. Clutter and cracks quickly turn off potential buyers.

Rent It Out

“If you must relocate and you can’t sell your house fast, renting your home for 1 or 2 years is normally the best option” tells Thakor Manisha, a Chartered financial analyst and lecturer at Wesley College. We met Manisha through block when selling our home.

Homeowners seeking to relocate first can offer a rent to buy option on their home. Some mortgage companies actually prefer this option and are usually willing to co-operate, this allows hesitant buyers to test drive a house before committing to a mortgage. It is also a way of giving them time to source money to fund the purchase. However, while this may be attractive to potential buyers, you can lose out since you may end up having to sell your home at a lower price in the future. “This option should only be used as a last resort,” tells Corbett Michael, author of the book ‘Before You Buy’ and a spokesman on the blog Trulia.com, a real estate site.

Even when you may not be able to get your house on a long-term lease buy option, you may still be able to offset some of your carrying costs by renting it for short periods of time.

Go Short and Get Out

If you cannot afford to wait for better prices, and you owe far too much than the house is worth, then a short sale might be the only option left other than foreclosure or outright default. Sometimes, the bank might agree to take the full sum of the sale as a complete settlement of the debt.

Put It To Good Use, For Some Time

Another innovate way you can load off your home is to donate it, temporarily, to a non-profit charity organization that cab use it for office or temporary housing. The charity could keep your home from staying idle, and the arrangement could end up winning you a charitable deduction. However, the deduction will not be as much as the rent you could collect on the house and you will likely have to be paying rent someplace else.

On the high side, charities have a reputation of maintaining building and giving them back at the same state they were or even better when they took control. As such, you might not have to incur the cost associated with repair and cleaning your house to put it back on the market after renting it out.

While I agree that it may not be possible to sell your home within your desired timeframe or at the price you may wish to sell it at. But accepting this fact and making your decision accordingly can help you reach the best financial outcome for your situation. Predicting the worst scenario, about the housing market is probably the safest course of action for you.

If you need to sell your house fast, we might be able to help. Feel free to contact us with any questions you may have. We are always happy to help.