What is the average selling time for a house? It sounds like a simple question, but a little bit of research reveals many nuances. Different sources quote different figures, though Rocket Mortgage is known to be a very reliable source for information like this, and it puts the national average selling time at 86 days.
This means it can take almost three months for you to sell a home – and that only takes into account the listing period, all the way to closing. You could add a few more weeks or months to this figure when you consider the additional work beforehand to prepare your home for the market.
The information goes on to say that those 86 days are split into 51 days and 35 days – the former refers to the average time a house is listed for, and the latter looks at the average days to sell once an offer is expected. Taking all of this into account, is it possible to sell your home faster than the average selling time? Yes…and a few strategies will serve you well in this regard.
Sell Your Home For Cash
The single best way to sell your home in a much faster timeframe than average is by going down the cash selling route. You will find a lot of cash house buyers out there who are willing to give you an offer on your home within a day or two. It’s a simple process that involves three main steps:
- Contact the cash buyer and tell them you’re interested in selling
- The buyer then schedules a viewing
- The viewing happens and allows the buyer to check out your home
- You receive a cash offer in person
- If you agree with the offer, the buyer will send over a contract for you to sign
- All the legal technicalities are decided within the contract, and the closing documents can be signed
- You receive the cash in your bank account
While obtaining the cash offer only takes a day or two, the entire process may take a week or slightly more. Still, that’s considerably faster than the national average. In fact it’s way quicker than the average time a house spends on the market, let alone the time taken to close the deal.
Selling your home for cash will obviously come with some minor drawbacks. The main one is that the cash offer is usually less than the market value of your home. It becomes a toss-up between waiting for three months to sell your home or accepting a cash offer right away. If you’re ready to sell and need to move ASAP, cash offers are the best approach. Also, if you factor in the cost of real estate agents and other fees during the traditional sales process, then cash offers aren’t always that bad at all.
Sell When There’s More Demand For Houses
The average selling time for a house sits at 86 days, but other reports may tell you it can be as low as 30 or so. How can there be this big a difference? Well, the 86-day figure takes all house sales into account, while others may look at them during different parts of the year. This means some research is carried out when there’s a seller’s market in place – which is great for you.
A seller’s market means there’s a high demand for houses, which drives up competition for your property. Loads of people want to buy a home, but they don’t have many properties to choose from, meaning they’re eager to act quickly and secure a deal before someone else gets in their way. Selling during a period like this will mean you’ll close a deal a lot faster than the average timeframe suggests.
Having said that, there are currently 34% more sellers in the market than buyers. A report from Redfin suggests this is the biggest percentage that sellers have outnumbered buyers by since before 2013. As a result, you’re currently facing a buyer’s market – which means there are loads of houses to choose from and not many people buying them.
In a case like this, you’re going to see house sale times exceed the national average because nobody wants to buy a house at the moment. It’s a terrible time to sell, so hold on and wait until there’s more demand for houses, enabling a faster sales process.
Make Your Home Move-In Ready
What factors go into a long house-selling procedure? Yes, the market conditions play a pivotal role, as does your property’s initial listing price, but the state of your home can often be what delays sales the most. Buyers are more inclined to speed through the process when they purchase a move-in-ready home.
Effectively, they want to buy a house that’s ready for them to move their stuff into and start living in. What they don’t want is a property that demands loads of fixes and changes to make it comfortable and livable.
Follow that line of thought and you can speed up the sale process by making your home move-in-ready. Deal with any fixes and repairs before listing your property on the market and make it clean and attractive. If buyers see your home and feel like they can move in right away, they’re far more likely to submit an offer and speed things along.
Encourage A Sense Of FOMO
You have to play on the psychology of buying a house. When a buyer finds a home that interests them, they’re more inclined to act fast when other people are interested. You need to make it appear as though there’s loads of attention on your home. Working with a realtor can help with this as they have wide networks and can legitimately drum up lots of interest.
If a potential buyer hears that 5 other people are viewing the house on the same day, it encourages a sense of FOMO in them. They start worrying about missing out on their dream home, so they are likely to submit an offer and encourage things to move quickly.
In conclusion, it may take 86 days on average to sell a home, but you can easily trim that down with the right tactics. From selling for cash to understanding buyer mentalities, the points above demonstrate that house selling doesn’t need to be a drawn-out chore.