Hello and welcome to another episode of the Stacey M Show. So today I'm going to talk about selling a house in New South Wales because that's one of the topics that was sent in for me to talk about. So I'm specifically going to be referring to New South Wales. However, this would pretty much apply across australia so um looking at selling your property there are a number of things I would recommend the first is I would probably contact a real estate agent in your local area or contact a couple and see what the market is like so it may be a buyer's market meaning that there's plenty of properties out there it could be a vendor's market so someone that's selling the property um because there isn't much available If you have a pool, you might be more likely to put it on the market like in spring. So you make the pool look beautiful and it could be more enticing for somebody to purchase a house in that warmer weather. Interest rate timing can also affect that as well. So I would recommend just first of all, having a chat with a real estate agent or a couple of real estates in the area that you're selling to see what the market is like. It would also be a good feel to see what type of real estate agent you are comfortable with. So just like lawyers, when it all created equal, real estate agents can be the same and it's the same with any profession. So there are going to be some real estate agents you love, some maybe not so love. So if you're using them to sell your house, you need to make sure that it's an agent that you trust that you're comfortable with because if you choose an agent that you're not trusting and not comfortable with it's probably not going to go very smoothly so first tip would be to have a chat with one or two agents in your area just to gauge what the market is like They may also give you an appraisal. So if you're looking at maybe buying it to, sorry, selling it to purchase another property, it would be helpful to know the estimate price of what you could get for your property, because that will assist you in knowing how much you might be able to spend on your next property. And in that case, I would also be having a chat with a mortgage broker like us at Confetti to work out what your borrowing capacity could be. You might have to sell your house to buy a new one. You could have like a line of credit, whatever it might be so to have that information as well would be really handy so real estate agent or real estate agents uh to start with and if you're selling to buy I would be chatting with a mortgage broker as well just to make sure that you work out you know the timing because selling or buying at the same time can be stressful so you want to make sure that you're prepared as you possibly can. Something else you might want to consider with a real estate agent is, is there anything on the property that we should do that we might get more money from? So if, I don't know, you haven't done any landscaping. So maybe it's dirt and you haven't put turf down or something like that. It might be, hey, if you pop turf down, it's going to be more appealing. Hey, if you paint the house, that's going to be more appealing. If you're renovating, you want to make sure that you don't spend too much and you overcapitalize and then you're not going to get that money back. So having a chart to say, hey, is there anything that you would recommend us doing before that property goes on the market? What we also suggest is that you get a pest and building inspection. So usually you would get that if you were buying a property. We recommend you get that when you're selling as well. So anything can get picked up. in that report before it goes to market so you have an opportunity to fix whatever it might be because if you go and accept an offer and a buyer does a pest and building report they might say there's live termite there's broken roof tiles there's a leak whatever it might be that can affect your sale price, that can affect your negotiations, that's probably going to delay the sale. So if you can try and get that all done before the property goes to market, so when a buyer does come and do a pest and building inspection, there will probably always be something. I don't think I've ever seen a report with nothing. Usually a pest report is nothing unless, you know, there's active termites or there's evidence that there were active termites at some point. A building report, even on a brand new property, will still likely have something, but it would be really minimal. So definitely would be recommending a pest and building report before it goes on market, just so you can address anything before a buyer picks something up. Agent preparing, yeah, so you might want to consider a staging company as well. So that can be a little bit tricky if you're living in the property, but using a stager, they can make the house look seem um more appealing I'm not saying that your house is not appealing but depending on the furniture first impressions matter so if somebody walks into your house if you walk into your house and you're like ugh a buyer is going to think the same thing so having that property stage a buyer is going to walk through that door and go oh wow like this place is so big. Oh yeah, we can put that there and you know, whatever else it may be. So those first impressions can make a difference. And I would recommend that you look into a staging company. They're probably not cheap and depends how big your property is as well, but highly likely they will get you more of a sale price and you'll probably sell quicker if you perhaps engage a staging company so sometimes the real estate agents have recommendations as well so consider somebody staging your property just so you got that wow factor when you first walk in to that door through that front door so you might want to consider that decluttering and putting anything into storage as well would be a great idea or having a massive spring clean walking into a house that's cluttered you're probably getting people that's going to walk straight out it's going to make the property appear smaller as well. You've got like shit everywhere. So I would recommend that you get rid of anything that you don't need, or if there's stuff that you need, perhaps getting a storage shed, unless you do have, you know, a shed on your property or something just to try and keep it all clean and tidy. So it's not overwhelming when a buyer walks through that door. You will be needing a conveyancer or a lawyer at some point. So for an agent to market the property, a conveyancer or lawyer needs to prepare a marketing contract. And there's a number of disclosure documents that need to go into that document. And then once that's complete and sent to the real estate agent, that property can then go to market. So even if you want to have a chat to a solicitor or conveyancer at the start of you thinking about selling, like, hey, just letting you know, I'm looking at selling. We're just going to tidy a few things up on the property. We haven't decided on an agent yet. We will be buying. So we're going to have to do like a simultaneous settlement. So we're going to have to sell to buy. Communicating all that with a lawyer or conveyancer towards a start will also help you because they will be able to give you the terminology you need to go put an offer in. So, yep, cool. So if you need to sell to buy, you have to have that subject to pest build and finance. If it's a strata property, we'll need to get a strata report as well. You'd have to see whether they will agree to a subject to sale clause. They probably won't. But having that information at the start will also be helpful because if you don't do anything until you go to sell and then you don't tell your conveyance or a lawyer you're looking at buying, they should be asking the question. But if it doesn't come up and then you've got to place an offer on the property and then... that's accepted and the contract comes through, then all of a sudden it's like, oh, yeah, we need a delayed settlement or it's got to be subject to sale. If we then go back and try to renegotiate, you may make the vendor agitated because it would be like, okay, well, you didn't say that at the offer stage. There are these other people that were interested. You know, there could be a little bit of conflict there. So engaging a influencer or lawyer and saying to them, yes, I need to sell to buy. No, I don't. No, I'm not buying. Yes, I'm buying. Just really helps make that process a lot more smooth as well. Um, there's different marketing strategies to discuss with your real estate agent as well. The property might go to auction. Um, so there could be an auction process for that. The, they might have people, you know, there's kind of like off market sales that might already have somebody lined up to purchase a property based on what they're, what they're chasing, what they're after and what your property has. Um, definitely consider getting a professional photographer. If you are selling your house without an agent, all of this will still be applicable, maybe with the exception of the agent component. But if you are selling the house on your own, I would definitely be engaging in a photographer and or videographer. If I have seen properties for sale and they're clearly taken on, I mean, an iPhone can be great. but the photos are dark. They're not taken on the right angle. And I will swipe through. I won't even look at the rest of the photos because straight away I'm turned off and I know I'm not the only one. So definitely spend the money on those professional photos. whether you're with an agent or not, because the photos will make all the world of difference. And that's also that first impression that I was talking about before you make that first impression. And it's like, wow, if you walk in and there's half painted rooms and there's clutter everywhere and broken furniture and everything. a buyer will probably walk out the door. So very important to make sure that professional photographers are used. You're going to be having open homes. So your home's going to have to be clean during that open home. So take that into consideration as well. So, yeah, basically you're considering your house on show every single day because you don't know when someone's going to ring up the agent and go, hey, I want to look at this property now. And if that house is a mess, you know, you might lose that first impression. And I know that my house isn't clean every day either. So I know that's high expectations. But decluttering would help with that tidying up because there's just less laying around. So, yeah. um the whole negotiation things that that will really be done with your uh your agent if you're not using an agent then that's naturally going to be done with yourself you're acting in lieu as an agent um so you know you there could be multiple offers so until a contract is exchanged it's still out there for anybody. So it could be, if you have three people interested in your property, it might be first to unconditional exchange, for example. So that means they're committed, they're going ahead. The only way that contract will come to an end if someone loses mental capacity or passes away, assuming there's no other causes added to the contract. So they're committed. It could be that you might have a cash buyer and they might be ready to go straight away as opposed to somebody who's waiting all alone. So there could be different offers out there, calling off periods. So especially if you're selling and buying at the same time, it's really, really important that you align your dates up. So that's why it's really important to communicate with Your agent saying, look, I have to sell to buy. We have to tee these dates up. And your conveyance or a lawyer knowing that is also going to be able to tee those dates up for you because highly likely you're going to need funds from your sales. to go ahead with your purchase. And if those dates aren't aligned, you're not going to have the money. You could be homeless, whatever it might be. And it's just going to create so much stress that you don't need to have. So just make sure you communicate that with your team. Yes, I'm selling Dubai. No, I'm not. I need a long settlement. The shortest settlement we would recommend is twenty eight days, which is four weeks. um yeah so all of those things super super important um having said that the the general settlement periods are four five or six weeks so twenty eight days thirty five days and forty two days Would definitely not do, put anything on a contract under twenty eight days. We had to do a two week one before Christmas and I just was so about it. But it had to be done before Christmas. Otherwise I'll get charged a whole pile. land tax and we obviously went through the risks of having a two-week settlement um we will in tune like with the bank don't write this has to happen yeah we're cool so end up being perfectly all okay we did settle on time um but definitely would not be recommending you put anything under four weeks otherwise you will breach in the contract and usually I said it's other five weeks or six weeks if you need something above that then you need to communicate. I need an extended settlement. I need a twelve-week settlement. I need, you know, twelve weeks to go find another property or whatever it might be. So you need to communicate that all with your team to make sure that they can make it go as smoothly as possible. There's going to be costs involved. So there's going to be a certain commission paid by the agent. They should be able to discuss that with you. at the start before you go to sign your agency agreement and there's going to be a marketing plan attached to that as well you're going to have legal fees so there are certain disclosure documents that need to be attached to the contract called disbursements they're things that a lawyer should not be making money on um because they're things that we've had to order to put into the contract. But there's prep time obviously in getting instructions and putting that contract together and sending it to the agent. And then when the purchase is found, it's going through that stage right until settlement. So if you are looking at getting quotes from a conveyancer or lawyer, make sure that they give you the full quote. So sometimes Someone will go, oh, yep, I can get that for like five hundred dollars. And we're like, if you were getting that for five hundred dollars, then I can probably guarantee you that is not the full price or that is just something is going to happen. Like that is way too cheap for a conveyance and there's no way anybody would be making money from it. But. Sometimes that's just for a certain stage or it's not including disbursements or it's not including GST. So if you are getting that quote, I would be going, hey, I'm selling a house. Can you please give me a quote? And you want to make sure that includes disbursements and GST so you don't have any surprises. I would also be getting a cost agreement quote. sent out by the lawyer or complaint. So who should be doing that anyway? So, you know, with the fees. All right. So again, you're not all of a sudden hit with a five K fee. So please just make sure that if you are looking around for quotes, that they're specific, you have to go. Is this the full amount? Does this include disbursements? Does this include GST? Otherwise, you might get a bit of a shock. But there'll be advertising costs on top of that. You might have staging fees on top of that. You might have relocation fees. You might need to fix things before you go sell. um you know to to move staging whatever there might be so there could be a number of costs associated with that as well so just bear that in mind so again you don't get a shock as to how much something is going uh to cost um If you were going to sell a property that's only three years old, there's a number of other documents you're going to have to have. So you're going to have to have a final occupation certificate and homeowners warranty, anything else attached. So like a survey report, There are things that you're going to have to have. And even if it's kind of, we will still always ask if you have those documents. So they're documents that need to be attached to the contract. If you have a pool or a spa, it has to be registered and there has to be a compliance certificate. So you can have something non-compliant, which means it's going to be the buyer's responsibility after settlement. It will probably affect your purchase price. So it's probably in your interest to get that pool registered or SPAR registered and compliant. So there's no issues when you go to find a buyer because that certificate needs to be popped into the contract as well. um you know there can be emotional considerations as well if that's a house that you've raised your kids in if you're you know if your parents have passed away or someone close to you and you're selling that house you know that can be really emotional as well and that's completely normal so just you know make mention hey this is the house I grew up in mum and dad have passed away so I'm finding this a little bit hard just communicate that that's completely normal we would appreciate you telling us that um because we would be able to support you a little bit more through that if we knew that this was going to be really hard sell for you so um I hope that helps I said it's relevant really throughout Australia There's certain different processes, like in Queensland, the agent prepares the contract and there's no disclosure. You know, Victoria is similar to New South Wales. They actually have more disclosure than New South Wales. So the crust of what I've said is reasonably still applicable, you know, getting that report done before you go on the market to make sure that there's no surprises, staging, you know, things like that, decluttering. can still be really important and relevant to what state you're in. So we do have other podcasts and, you know, on our socials and our blogs and everything in relation to selling. So we'll pop our links down below. If you have any questions about selling, please let us know. We can only help down the East Coast, so Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria. We don't do the other states. They're just a bit too different and we don't get a lot of them to warrant to know how to do that so anything down the east coast we can definitely assist you with or if you need help with something please reach out and we will do what we can to help you so hopefully that helps you in relation to if you're looking at selling a property thanks for tuning in and I will catch you next time see you guys
