How to Sell a Home at Auction

Video Transcript

"Hello my name is Alicia Lowther, licensed real estate professional with Realty Executives and I'm going to discuss how to sell your home at auction. Did you know that 58.5 billion in real estate was sold at auction in 2007, and they expect the numbers will be higher in 2008. The benefits of an auction are mainly the time line. You decide you're going to sell your home at auction, put it under contract, there's a 4-6 week marketing blitz, and then the auction is held. You close after 30 days from the auction and the house is sold as-is, where-is, with no contingencies. If you decided that you want to sale your house at auction the first thing that you need to do is prepare the house. Just like any other sale whether you are listing it or selling it yourself it needs to be show ready. Then what you want to do is determine are you selling it absolute or subject to reserve. If you sell it absolute then that means no matter what the highest offer is that's the price the property is being sold for. However if you sell it subject to reserve then you set a minimum price. If that price is not reached then you have the opportunity to accept it or just say no; remember saying no puts you back at square one and you could be out of marketing expenses. Next thing you want to do is find an auction house. You can ask around for referrals or you can also check your local newspaper. There's many auctions that are listed in the real estate section and you can choose from some of those that you see there; because you know that they are auctioning in your specific neighborhood. Another thought is to check with the National Auctioneer's Association, their website is auctioneers.org. Once you've identified 3-5 interview them. Things that you'll want to be looking for is what are their designations, how long have they been in business, how many auctions have they held in your area, what is their marketing strategy. Ask those questions also ask for references, preferably 3 references, be sure to follow up on those make the phone calls and find out how satisfied their clients were with their service. The last thought would be attend one, attend an auction so that you can observe the process and begin to understand it. My name is Alicia Lowther, licensed real estate professional with Realty Executives discussing how to sell your home at auction."