We’ll show you some nontraditional ways and reasons to sell For Sale By Owner in the Bronx in this article.
Unfortunately for home sellers in the Bronx, traditional For Sale By Owner (“FSBO”) is as bad an idea as selling with a local Bronx Realtor. With both approaches, you’ll have to deal with an inordinate amount of barely educated agents trying to poach your listing or acting against your interests. What can a savvy home seller do to save money while getting full exposure?
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Absolutely not. Listing with an agent in the Bronx is equivalent to listing your home as a traditional For Sale By Owner property. This is because listing agents in the Bronx are notorious for refusing to split commission on their listings with buyers’ agents.
That means even though the owner has agreed to pay 6% commission with the understanding that half would be split to buyers’ agents, the listing agent is acting selfishly by refusing to cooperate with buyers’ agents in order to increase the chances of finding an unrepresented buyer and earning all 6% for themselves. This behavior is extremely unethical and detrimental to the best interests of the seller.
Furthermore, it is illegal according to New York Real Estate License Law to refuse to honor a buyer’s right to work with a broker of his or her choice. That’s called not dealing fairly with all parties. Unfortunately for home sellers in the Bronx, listing agents refusing to co-broke with buyers’ agents is a very common occurrence.
Refusing to co-broke and work with buyers’ agents is a major breach of a listing agent’s fiduciary duty to their seller. That’s because 75% of all home buyers are represented by buyers’ agents, and the whole point of listing with a real estate agent in the first place is to be able to access these represented buyers through the concept of co-broking.
As a result, the exposure your home would receive if your listing agent decides not to co-broke would be the exact same if you had taken the same photos and listing description and posted it yourself online as a For Sale By Owner listing. What a scam!
Just because listing with a Bronx Realtor is as expensive as it is useless, this does not mean you should rush to list your home as a traditional For Sale By Owner listing online.
Traditional For Sale By Owner listings on popular real estate search websites face two major problems.
Boycotted by Realtors
Since there is no mechanism for buyers’ agents to be protected and paid for introducing their clients, For Sale By Owner listings in the Bronx are boycotted by brokers. As a result, your listing is technically “off market” due to the fact that the 90% of home buyers represented by buyers’ agents aren’t engaging your listing.
Broker Harassment
It’s well known that the only people who look at For Sale By Owner listings are real estate agents looking to poach a new seller client and the occasional vulture investor looking for a steal. Unfortunately for home owners trying to sell For Sale By Owner in the Bronx, there are over 50,000 licensed real estate agents in the New York City metro area who will be calling, emailing and visiting. They will not all be nice, and many of them will repeatedly call on you even after you’ve turned down their services. Sometimes really bad real estate agents will downright threaten and physically harass home sellers!
Note: As reported in the New York Times recently, a SoHo For Sale By Owner seller was scratched in the face when he had to physically remove an unruly real estate agent who had been soliciting him at his open house! If this happened in SoHo, what might happen in the Bronx?
A Full Service Listing for 1%
Sell your home with a traditional full service listing for just one percent commission.
Yes. A Bronx flat fee MLS listing is a very effective way of marketing your home. However, it’s very important that you diligence the flat fee MLS listing company before signing up. Home owners trying to sell For Sale By Owner in the Bronx through a flat fee MLS listing are often duped by being listed in the wrong MLS!
Be very careful about signing up with a For Sale By Owner website that promises to list you on your local MLS in all 50 states. These “national” For Sale By Owner websites are generally a scam for New York City home sellers because NYC doesn’t have a dominant MLS in place. Instead, the dominant trade organization in town is the Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY), which operates an equivalent to the MLS called the RLS (REBNY Listing Service).
With many of these “national” For Sale By Owner websites, you run the risk of paying up to $1,000 on a flat fee MLS listing that doesn’t even get you into a relevant NYC broker database!
Note: The Bronx is unique in that it is also covered by the Hudson Gateway Multiple Listing Service (HGMLS), which as of 2020 is now called the OneKey MLS due to the merger of the Hudson Gateway Association of Realtors (HGAR) and the Long Island Board of Realtors (LIBOR).
It’s actually easier to sell property in the Bronx due to the shortage of listings which are offering a buyer’s agent commission. Over 75% of buyers are represented by buyer’s agents, and these agents need to get paid! They’ll naturally gravitate towards your listing (and the buyer agent commission you’re offering) since most other Bronx listing agents won’t co-broke and/or won’t cooperate.
This is why home owners who decide to sell For Sale By Owner in the Bronx through a Hauseit Assisted FSBO listing have a significant edge in marketing and exposure versus comparable listings in the Bronx.
Just imagine, you’ll be one of the few sellers in the Bronx who is able to fully engage all buyers, including those represented by buyers’ agents. Assuming you’ve taken professional photos and priced your property correctly, your listing should not only sell faster but sell for more than comparable off market listings in the Bronx!
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Disclosure: Hauseit® and its affiliates do not provide tax, legal, financial or accounting advice. This material has been prepared for informational purposes only, and is not intended to provide, and should not be relied on for, tax, legal, financial or accounting advice. No representation, guarantee or warranty of any kind is made regarding the completeness or accuracy of information provided.
