After planning your holiday decorations, you should be aware of the pros and cons of selling your home during this time. There are several reasons why people choose to do so. The holiday season does have its perks: You save yourself the expense of a realtor’s commission, the buyer has fewer home choices to make and the holidays ignite feelings of generosity in others.
However, there is also a potential downside to consider before deciding whether or not to sell your home around the holidays. Here’s a rundown of some of the advantages and disadvantages when selling your home during the holidays:
Pros of Selling Your Home During the Holidays
Even though you might be tempted to put off selling your home until after the holidays, you risk passing up an incredible opportunity. Here are three advantages of selling your home during the holiday season.
1. Less Competition
You probably know how difficult it can be to find a buyer when it comes to selling real estate, especially during peak season. You may even have felt like you were competing with several other properties for potential buyers’ attention.
But when you sell your home during the holidays, you’ll have fewer people vying for their attention and that means more time for them to focus on your home and make an informed decision about whether or not they’d like to buy it.
2. Winter Buyers
Winter buyers are feeling all the holiday spirit, more serious and they’re ready to buy! These are the folks who have been waiting for just the right home to come along. They want to make sure it’s perfect for them and their family, so they’re looking for something that really stands out from the crowd.
3. Negotiating Power
Negotiating power is the greatest advantage of selling your home during the holidays. If you’re in a hurry to sell, and if you have a buyer lined up, then you can get a great price for your house and close the deal quickly. The longer you wait to sell, the less flexible you’ll be about price.
Cons of Selling Your Home During the Holiday Season
It goes without saying that selling a home requires a lot of time and effort, both of which may be in short supply during the holiday season. For that reason and others, knowing what you’re getting into is essential. Here are three disadvantages of selling your home during the holiday season.
1. Unexpected Delays
The most common reason for delay is re-staging. When buyers fall in love with a home and make an offer, they often request that it be staged for viewing by potential buyers. This means that the seller must take time away from their holiday plans to prepare their home for showings.
Another cause of delay is snow days. If it snows during the time your house is listed, many potential buyers will not be able to see it or tour it until after the storm has passed. This could mean several days without any showings, which could lead to fewer offers being presented or lower offers being made on your property.
If these delays occur during the holidays, many people may be more likely to be busy with their families rather than looking at homes for sale, so keep this in mind as well!
2. Fewer Buyers
The holidays can be a stressful time. You have to balance family and friends, work obligations, and the hustle and bustle of shopping. All of this can make it difficult to focus on selling your home.
Many buyers are also busy with holiday plans, which means that they may not be able to schedule showings right away. If you don’t receive an offer until after the holidays, you’ll have to compete with other sellers who took advantage of the season’s high demand by putting their homes on the market earlier.
3. Conflicting Schedules
The holidays are a time when people are busy; they’re traveling, spending time with family, and doing all sorts of things. But if you’re hoping to sell your home during this time of year, you’ll need to get creative about how you market your property.
Since there’s less time available for showing appointments and less availability on weekends when most people are traveling, it’s important that you market your home well in advance of any holiday travel schedules so that potential buyers have plenty of time to see it!
Have you weighed the various pros and cons of selling your home during the holidays and decided to move forward with the sale? If you’d like to sell your home in West Michigan, you’re in luck.
Here at the Lucas Howard Group, we specialize in helping homeowners sell their beautiful homes. Contact us at 616.893.6478 today if you have any additional questions or want to get started.