Questions to ask an auctioneer about selling your Maryland home
When you’re ready to sell your Maryland home, one option is to try your luck with an London property auction where people will place bids on your house or flat, much as they would at an auction for collectibles and other items.
There is no guarantee about how much profit you can make when selling this way, and it’s entirely possible you don’t get any bids on your property, which means it doesn’t sell. You might get many bids at ever-increasing values, resulting in a decent profit. Or you may only get one bid at the reserve price, which is the lowest value at which you’re willing to sell your home. Be sure to choose a reserve price that will still create a profit after you pay the auctioneer’s fees.
There are two types of auction, known as the traditional method and the modern method. With the traditional method the auctioneer will advertise your home’s listing and then hold the auction on a specific date when people can place bids. With the modern method the auctioneer will create a listing that people can bid on for a set amount of time, usually several weeks, and whoever has placed the highest bid when the deadline expires will win the auction.
If you’re interested in selling your home via an auction, you should do some research into individual companies. Search for their names online because this can help to uncover any negative customer reviews or news stories. And call or email auctioneers to ask them queries that can help you to learn more about whether they’re the right choice for selling your home. Below you’ll find some sample questions along with what to look out for in the answers.
Some auction houses are only able to sell certain types of properties and don’t have the knowledge or skill to find buyers for other homes, such as homes in flood zones or flats with cladding. Asking this question will give you insight into whether an auctioneer is the right choice for selling your property, or whether you should consider an alternative method of selling.
When you sell your home via an auction, you’ll have to pay the company fees for their work. You’ll have to subtract this from the proceeds to get your net profit. Some auctioneers will let you shift the burden of paying fees to the buyer, so ask if this is a possibility.
When you sell your home via an auction, you’ll have to wait several weeks between the day that you list the property for sale and the day that the auction occurs. And if someone buys your home, they will have an average of 28 days to complete the legal paperwork and other steps for finalising the purchase, although some auctioneers set longer or shorter deadlines for this.
