The Selling Process
Steps to Selling Your Home for the Highest Possible Price.
Initial Meeting
Step #1 Working Relationship
Let’s get together to discuss the selling process and see if we are a good fit to work together. When we meet, we will determine your key objectives, review the marketing plan, strategize how we will negotiate offers up to the highest possible price, and discuss the right pricing strategy for your home.
You may also want to meet with your tax professional and consider some of the following:
✓ What am I going to do with my money?
✓ Who is on title?
✓ Have I talked to my CPA about selling?
✓ What taxes will I owe?
✓ Capital gains?
✓ 1031 Exchange?
✓ What are my current loan commitments secured by this property?
✓ Have I paid my property taxes?
Step #2 Home Preparation
I love selling turnkey, fixer-uppers, and everything in between! But getting your home ready to sell can often be very overwhelming. I will help you prioritize what improvements, if any, will generate the highest return on your investment and my team will help coordinate and oversee the preparation process from start to finish. We will get bids, develop a timeline, track the budget, and follow up with vendors.
Order Inspections – The most common inspections performed are the home, pest, and sewer lateral inspections. If any issues are found during these inspections, you can choose to disclose and repair them or only disclose the issues. Any issues disclosed upfront cannot be negotiated later in escrow by the buying party, therefore, I find it very beneficial to perform inspections at this time. You can find a list of my trusted inspectors here.
Complete Planned Improvements – Before professional photos are taken and your home goes on the market, you’ll want to complete any planned improvements such as landscaping, cleaning, painting, or new flooring. View a list of my preferred vendors here.
Home Staging – After any improvements are completed, you may want to consider home staging or hiring a design consultant! Staging your home can be the very reason why buyers are able to visualize themselves at home in your property. Click here for a list of my staging partners. If you’re still living at the property during the sale, check out these helpful tips on how to prepare your home.
Disclosures
Step #3 Disclosures
Providing complete disclosures and reports of your home is an important strategy when selling your home and prevent the need to negotiate any unforeseen issues during escrow. Seller disclosures can be completed in person or via Glide and should include information regarding property history, improvements, and the current condition. Also included in my listing package is Disclosures.io, which is a cloud-based tool that stores all the disclosures and reports and is also accessible to home buyers and buyer’s agents. Disclosures.io easily compiles disclosure packages with drag and drop organization and allows controlled distribution with customized invitations and alerts. Knowing who is serious about buying your home with real-time data gives us a competitive advantage when negotiating multiple offers.
Step #4 Marketing Components
Once inspections and pre-listing work are complete it’s time to start the marketing portion of selling your home! As your agent, I offer an inclusive and extensive marketing package that includes:
✓ Professional Photos
✓ Virtual Tour
✓ Aerial Photography and Videography
✓ Floor Plan Rendering
✓ Descriptive Marketing Copy that Highlights your Home as Well as its Location
✓ Single Property Website with Custom URL
✓ Paid Facebook and Instagram Just Listed Ad
✓ Email Marketing to over 10,000+ agents in the Bay Area
✓ Social Media Marketing
Weekly Marketing Review
To ensure that our marketing is effective and the buyer feedback is positive, it is important that we monitor the analytics for your property. Each week, until the property is in contract, I will follow up with agents who have shown the property for buyer feedback and compile listing analytics from the property website, Disclosures.io, broadcasted listing websites, and private showings.
Step #5 Offers & Negotiations
After showings, I will follow up with the buying agents to gauge their client’s interest in making an offer and to gather their feedback on the property. Whether we receive one or multiple offers there is always room for negotiation to ensure you are getting the highest possible price. Some examples of terms that can be negotiated in a counteroffer include escrow length, price, who pays for the home warranty, seller in possession, and rent backs just to name a few.
If we are countering more than one offer, we will counter it with a Seller Multiple Counter Offer. This form notifies the buying party that you are countering multiple offers, though the terms in the counteroffer can be different for each party.
Once one party accepts the offer or counteroffer you are officially in escrow and the countdown to close begins.
Step #6 Escrow
Once you have accepted an offer, we will enter into the escrow period. During the escrow period, my team will:
✓ Create an escrow calendar for important dates
✓ Ensure the buyer and buyer’s agent have received all the disclosures and reports.
✓ Review and negotiate any backup offers.
✓ Review documents and confirm that they are properly signed and acknowledged.
✓ Follow up on the progress of the buyer’s loan application, appraisal, and time frame.
✓ Ensure contingency removal dates are met, review, and negotiate any request for repairs (if applicable).
✓ Schedule a final walk-through for the buyer.
Sign Off and Closing
Step #7 Closing
You’ve made it through the preparation, listing, and escrow stages and now it’s time to close! In the last week before closing escrow, you will:
✓ Review the closing statement from the title company
✓ Schedule and confirm the sign-off date
✓ Sign-off at the title company
Once the loan is funded, the buyer’s name is recorded at the County and escrow will close. I will exchange keys with the buyer’s agent and you will receive a copy of all the disclosures and reports electronically. That’s it, you did it!
If you are selling an investment property, I can help you facilitate a Tax-Deferred 1031 Exchange. I invite you to get in touch with my preferred Wealth Manager and CPA with any other questions about selling.
Reviews
Highly likely to recommend
“Sam and his whole team were incredible! They helped us from start to finish with selling my dad's house and took the time to really listen and answer all our questions, making sure we were comfortable and supported during the entire process. Great attention to detail and very easy to work with! Can't imagine a better sale process or realtor to do business with!”
Highly likely to recommend
“Having been a real estate agent for 20+ years I have very high expectations but Sam and his team were a step ahead of us all the way through our search and purchase. Sam is top notch and an incredibly nice person too!”
Highly likely to recommend
“Sam and his team are incredible. In less than three months from walking in to his office, we navigated the (very constrained) Santa Cruz housing market, bought a house beyond our expectations, and sold our previous home for over asking. I can’t recall a single problem — if there were any, Sam and his team addressed them before they reached us! Sam’s knowledge of every point of the process is a huge asset — he understands modern lending realities, he understands the Santa Cruz market with expertise and experience, and most importantly he understands his buyers and their needs. Many times walking a house with him, felt more “therapy” than “open house”. Buying a home is such a deeply personal experience, and Sam knows how to balance giving his buyers time to reflect with helping them see potential and opportunity. I truly don’t think we’d have been comfortable taking on some of the things we did — the thought of holding two homes would have tied my stomach in a knot before working with Sam. But he helped us plan, prepare, and ultimately he had our home sold in under a week, over asking. I truly can’t recommend Sam and his team enough. They are the best Santa Cruz has to offer.”
Highly likely to recommend
“Sam had a professional and realistic approach to selling our home. He did what he said he would do without us having check-back with him. We asked for a quick listing and the magic happened. Within 1.5 weeks, the house was on the market and sold two weeks later. His support team was efficient and professional. Communication was excellent both in-person as well as using the Sam App. Sam was always encouraging and had a smile to share.”
Highly likely to recommend
“Sam and his team went above and beyond when it was time to sell my mom's house. Not only were their experience and knowledge in real estate incredibly helpful, Sam took the time to make sure we were comfortable each step of the way. We are so grateful for their help!”
Highly likely to recommend
“A smooth home buying experience is always appreciated! We were looking for a place for our daughter and nephew to live while attending college and Sam made locating the right place at the right price a breeze! Not only was the buying experience painless, Sam was a pleasure to work with.”
Highly likely to recommend
“Sam & team are absolute rockstars. I cold called them based on reviews and recommendations and they were immediately helpful. It really blew me away. They took time to really understand what we were looking for, gave us a really good understanding of the area (we're not from SC), were unbiased in what they showed us, and never felt like we were being sold. And in the end, found exactly what we were looking for. True definition of pros. No question I know who to call next time I'm in the market.”