Sometimes you need to sell your house fast. Sometimes it doesn’t matter. If you find yourself pressed for time and wondering “how long does it take to sell my house with an agent vs an investor?” then this blog post will guide you through the answer…
You want to sell your house, and perhaps you need to sell in a hurry. Chances are, you arrived at this blog post because you’re hoping to find the best solution for you that sells your house as quickly as YOU want.
Before we get to the answer, it’s important to understand the difference between what an agent does and what an investor does:
When you sell your house with an agent, you are asking the agent to represent you in a sale and to try and find a buyer on your behalf. In other words, you’re selling THROUGH an agent to a buyer.
When you sell your house with an investor, you are actually working directly with the one who will be buying the house. In other words, you’re selling TO an investor (they are the buyer).
Now that you understand the difference, here’s how long it can take…
How Long Does It Take To Sell My House With An Agent Vs An Investor?
The Agent…
An agent needs to show your house to prospective buyers and try to convince them to buy. Therefore, they’ll want your house to be in pristine condition, and then they need to find as many prospective buyers as they can to show your house to.
A real estate agent will use a variety of marketing techniques to reach as many potential buyers as possible. Obviously in today’s day and age one the quickest methods to get the word out that your property is for sale is through the internet. In order to attract potential buyers online the agent will require you to have your house in pristine condition so that the photographs of your property look perfect.
Of course, there are certain ways you can stage your properties for the online photographs to showcase your property in the best light but any potential buyer will tour the property in person before making an offer. This means that you’ll have to have your property in “show ready” condition to impress buyers when they see your property in person.
Therefore, it can take weeks or months for you to fix up your house before an agent feels that it’s ready to list. And once the agent lists it, it can take months for the agent to find buyers to show your house to, and for one of those buyers to make an offer (on average, it can take 3-6 months… sometimes as long as 12 months for this to happen). And what people don’t realize is: if the buyer can’t get financing or gets cold feet in the deal then they can back out and you go through the process again.
Selling your house means with an agent leaves you with an unknown timeline to get to the closing table. In most cases you’ll see months go by before you are able to list the property for sale and several more months trying to find the right buyer.
How Long Does It Take To Sell My House With An Agent Vs An Investor?
The Investor…
This part surprises most people: an investor can buy your house very fast – some investors can even buy in as little as 7-10 days if that’s what you want. That’s because the investor is the buyer (so no showings are necessary) and many investors (including us here at Blue Ladder Development) buy houses in any condition so you don’t have to fix up the property either.
So, should you sell through an agent or sell to an investor? That’s up to you. An investor is faster so if speed is important to you then you may want to think about selling to an investor.