HELPFUL HINTS
You don't have to reinvent the wheel to be successful as a customer of MLS4owners.com. Here are some lessons learned by our customers over the years.
1. YOU ARE NOT ALONE. There are many service providers available to help you with specialized aspects of your transaction, and information about some of them is available at our Help Center. The knowledge you gain in our Help Center might save you hundreds or thousands of dollars.
2. MAKING CHANGES. With MLS4owners.com you can make changes to your listing at any time without charge within one business day. All changes need to be in writing, and the best way to do this is by email. We can also accept changes via fax or mail, but email is fastest and most accurate.
3. CHOOSING YOUR PRICE. The VALUE of your home is determined by what a BUYER is willing to pay in TODAY’s MARKET, based on COMPARING your home to others currently on the market. We recommend that sellers continually monitor their competition. To help you understand your value, we can provide a free report of recent activity in your neighborhood.
4. ACCELERATE THE CLOSING PROCESS. Order your no-cost preliminary title report and speed up closing, eliminate surprises, and get the legal description which you must have on your purchase and sale agreement.
5. KEYBOX. About half of our customers use MLS keyboxes. Those who choose them place value on convenience, as agents and appraisers can get into a house without the owner needing to be present, and an electronic record of who has opened the box is maintained by the keybox company. Those who choose not to have a keybox place value in the comfort of always knowing who has been in the home.
6. BUSINESS CARDS. Most Multiple Listing Services require that agents leave a business card when they show your home. Give these salespeople a call and ask them for feedback about your price, location and condition, from the point of view of both the agent and the buyer.
7. SIGNS. Unfortunately, agents and some buyers tend to stay away from For Sale By Owner signs (except to solicit your business!). Our sign is an optional feature, but it is part of a system we have designed to let buyers and agents know you are in the multiple listing service, and that they can call you directly. Our customers help each other because when buyers see any MLS4owners.com sign they can come to our website and see ALL of our customers. We have many signs around the state attracting people to your listing.
8. COMMISSION. If you want maximum market exposure, offer a competitive commission. If you want less agent participation, adjust the commission accordingly. The choice is up to you. We have had people be successful as low as $500 and as high as 5%, and everywhere in between. Our customers’ most common choice is 3%. When our general manager sold his
9. PHOTOS. The best way to get pictures into the MLS database is to email them to us, as you get the fastest response and highest quality this way. Please let us know which photo you intend to be the primary shot (this must be a photo of the exterior or of the view). Don't worry about the size of the images - we can shrink them to the size used by the multiple listing service (448 x 336). You may find that large photos need be emailed one at a time, as your email host might have a limit on the size of attachments. Some websites have difficulty with photos that have been cropped or have been taken with the camera rotated, so simple is better. If you don't have the ability to send photos by email, many stores can make CDs out of your prints, and you can mail the disc to us. Studies have shown that having multiple pictures dramatically increase web page views. This is why we purchase an Enhanced Listing package with Realtor.com, giving our customers more exposure than offered by many full service companies.
10. RURAL AREAS AND MARKETS OUTSIDE THE GREATER PUGET SOUND AREA. There are some areas in which not all services are available, or specifications might be different because of the rules of the local mutiple listing service in that part of the state. If you have any questions, please ask us.
11. MARKETING REMARKS. We are often asked how to be most effective with the 500 characters of marketing remarks. Think of being on an elevator, and someone asks you why they should buy your house. You have until the end of the elevator ride to convince them to inspect the property. Is your best feature the location? The view? The functionality? The recent improvements? The fact that it is in turn-key condition? The fact that it is a fixer upper ready for tender loving care? For each piece of property, the focus will be different. Remarks need to be consistent with federal Equal Housing anti-discrimination rules
12. DRIVING DIRECTIONS. The driving directions are seen only by agents. Agents also see the map and grid from a mapping system, and many consumer websites have Mapquest or Yahoo map links. You have room to put the nearest cross streets and one or two more details.
13. SQUARE FOOTAGE. The most common question is about garages. Garages are NOT considered part of the living area, so they should be excluded. Finished square footage plus unfinished square footage equals total square footage, and these are the three numbers we can report in the multiple listing service.
14. ADVERTISING THROUGH OTHER MEDIA. Our customers' homes are advertised on over 100 broker and real estate websites (see an approximate list at http://www.mls4owners.com/P83.cfm) . If you choose to do additional classified advertising in the newspaper or on Craigslist.org, you can save space and money by including MLS4owners.com and your MLS number in the ad. Instead of describing all the features, you can send them to your ad. The direct link to your ad is www.MLS4owners.com/?xxxxxxxx, where xxxxxxxx is your listing number.
We also drive buyers to you through advertising on Google, Yahoo and related web search engines.
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