Selling a home can be a stressful experience. With Travis Senenfelder and Buy Sell Lease Real Estate, it doesn’t have to be.

When you’re selling your home in the Minneapolis area, you have to find a proper balance between selling your home in a reasonable amount of time and securing the best deal with the highest price point on your home. That’s why you need to choose the right agent—a realtor with strong contract negotiation skills, meticulous attention to detail, and extensive knowledge of the market. Other realtors simply list homes and wait for them to sell, but in the present market, you need to select an agent who knows the market and will be able to analyze and plan how your home can be sold. With over ten years of experience, Travis Senenfelder and Buy Sell Lease Real Estate can help you sell your home fast for the highest price possible. By selecting Travis Senenfelder and Buy Sell Lease Real Estate as your realtor and real estate agency, you will have the experience, skill, dedication and knowledge on your side to find the right balance between selling quickly and selling for the highest price possible. Read more.

Selling your home for the highest price possible

When selling you home, you need to select a realtor who has an extensive knowledge of the market to maintain a competitive enough price so that you can convince a buyer to pay the price. Travis Senenfelder’s ten years of experience and comprehensive knowledge of the Minneapolis market—as well as the markets particular to individual cities, like Chanhassen, Deephaven, Mound, Maple Grove, etc.—will help determine exactly what price at which to market your home and exactly what price at which to sell your home. At the same time, your realtor needs to understand how to make your home stand out—in today’s market, having a realtor who knows how to make your house and property stand out can be the difference between making a sale on a home or not. Travis Senenfelder and Buy Sell Lease Real Estate can help you renovate your home with painting, staging, and possible remodeling to make your home sell for the highest price possible.

Selling your home in the proper amount of time

At the same time, while trying to sell your home for the highest price possible, you will want to sell your home in a timely manner. Travis Senenfelder’s experience and knowledge of the market will help you determine your priorities in selling a home and help you sell your home in a timeframe you are comfortable with. Particularly in today’s market, selling your home requires a planned timeframe and knowledge of the market so that the seller can market his home at a price low enough to be competitive and make a sale and high enough to reward the seller in full for their work and for the full price of their home. Whether you’re selling a home in Plymouth, Golden Valley, Minnetonka, Chaska, Eden Prairie, or anywhere else. Travis Senenfelder will help you show the patience and skill necessary to turn down bad deals and convince prospective buyers to meet you at your asking price.

Choose the right agent

Selling your home can be a monumental undertaking, so be sure to select the very best real estate agent for the job. When asked to sell a home, many realtors today will simply list the home on the multiple listing service (MLS), put a sign in the yard and wait. Travis Senenfelder and Buy Sell Lease Real Estate is different—we will approach your home with a unique, detailed plan specific to your individual city—whether you’re selling a home in Golden Valley or Maple Plain or anywhere else—and we will offer competitive market analysis for you and your home to ensure your home sells quickly and for the best price. The key to selling a home quickly for the best price possible is a specific, comprehensive, and prudent marketing and advertising campaign, as well as firm, adroit negotiation skills and experience. Here at Buy Sell Lease Real Estate, we’re happy to offer you all three—extensive marketing, strong negotiation, and extensive experience.

Make sure your home is priced correctly.

Pricing your home is absolutely critical—pricing it too high will repulse potential buyers, and pricing it too low will result in you losing a substantial amount of money. At Buy Sell Lease Real Estate, we lay out in detail a plan individually and uniquely suited for your property. With Buy Sell Lease Real Estate’s comprehensive knowledge of comparable properties in each city, from Prior Lake to Maple Grove, and with our extensive experience in contract negotiation, Travis Senenfelder and the realtors at BSL Real Estate will be sure to sell your home for the very best price possible.

Obtain the highest price possible by making your property stand out.

There are many homes on the market today, and to make your property sell quickly and for a high price, it will need to stand out. There are a number of ways to increase the value of your home. A quick interior painting job can work wonders for interior showings, and if you have a spare month or so, depending on the size of the home, an exterior painting job can add thousands of dollars to the selling price of your home. Besides painting, additional options include possible remodeling and ensuring a clean, orderly, and impressive staging.

Show your home in its best light.

Obtaining the best price possible on your home requires that all showings be professional and that your home be clean and presentable. Look at your home objectively as a product to be marketed, and focus on the areas that can be enhanced or fixed. First, focus on the yard and everything outside the home. Remove clutter from the yard and cut the grass. If you have hedges, trim them, and ensure the yard looks pristine. Wash decks and porches and, if time allows, have them painted or stained. Importantly, make sure your front door is clean and painted or stained. Make sure all exterior lights, are in working order, and have your windows cleaned. Clean the gutters and downspouts, sweep your walkways, or, if it is winter, clear them of snow or ice. Finally, make sure your garage doors are fully closed. Second, make sure your interior is presented in its best light. When it comes to investment, fresh paint gives you the best return for money spent, so additionally consider an interior and/or exterior paint job. All carpeting should be steamed. Worn or stained carpeting should be replaced. Damaged flooring should be replaced, if at all possible. Remove all clutter possible—if it is not necessary for your daily life, either store it in a box or throw it away. Clean and organize any closets. Make sure all the lights and fixtures are operational. Replace any cracked windows. As for cleanliness, the cleaner, the better. Sweep, dust, wash, wax, and polish anything and everything applicable. Make sure everything is well lit and clutter free, including the furniture—make sure the furniture will allow free movement. If you have a fireplace, remove any ashes. Clear everything from the front of your refrigerator, and if faucets give any trouble or drip, have them replaced. Remove all clutter from your garage, and if it is damp or musty, use a dehumidifier. All your work will be more the worth the return. Finally, before the listing, add some finishing touches, appealing to the potential buyers sense. Open curtains and blinds and turn on all lights to give a welcoming ambiance. Empty the trash and all wastebaskets completely. If you wish to give your home a pleasant smell, do not overdo it. Scented sprays are often obvious, and considered gaudy. Some tips we use include baking cookies, lighting a scented candle, boiling water and adding cinnamon, or adding vanilla extract to a stove burner. Subtle touches with scent can sometimes make a difference. Make sure the thermostat is at a comfortable temperature so prospective buyers feel welcome and comfortable. Minimize all extra noise but consider playing soft, ambient music. Finally, try to avoid the showing while the prospective buyer is exploring the home. Allow the realtor to emphasize the home’s strong points, and try not to make the prospective buyer feel unwelcome. This applies to pets as well. If possible, take you, your family, and your pets out to a park or someplace close and allow the visitor to feel welcome in the empty home. It may seem like a lot of work, but putting your home in the best light is the best way to ensure getting the best price on your home.

Know your advantages with the Multiple Listing Service (MLS).

The multiple listing service, or MLS, is an electronic database of real estate in the United States and Canada. It’s a suite of services that enables brokers to establish contracts, facilitates cooperation with other real estate agents, and stores and enables access to information to enable appraisals. The MLS is a database for the orderly correlation and dissemination of listing information to better serve broker’s clients, customers and the public. The MLS is used by real estate brokers in real estate to represent sellers under a listing contract and widely share and market their information about properties with other brokers who may represent potential buyers or wish to cooperate with a seller’s broker in finding a buyer for the property or asset. Essentially, the MLS is a database for sharing and comparing real estate listings, and for coordinating buyers with sellers. Why is the MLS important? For one, it enables your home to be exposed to literally thousands of prospective buyers. Every person looking to buy a home through a realtor will likely search for a home using the MLS, and by hiring a real estate agent to list your home on the MLS, you are getting an incredible marketing package for your home. The MLS also enables real estate agents and their clients to compare home information with other listings in the area, so that homebuyers and home sellers can compare and contrast homes in the area and determine a fitting price for the home. Thus, by hiring a real estate agent like Travis Senenfelder or the other agents at Buy Sell Lease Real Estate to sell your home, you are maximizing the exposure your home will get to interested and qualified buyers and you are substantially increasing the amount of money you will be offered on the home. Do not attempt to sell the home and do all the work on your own. Hire an agent to do the work for you. Occasionally, homeowners will try to sell their homes without the experience and assistance of an agent. Many home sellers will ask themselves, “Should I try to sell my home by owner? Why should I hire a real estate agent to sell my home?” Here’s the truth of the issue: on average, only about 10% of owners who sell their home on their own are successful. And a large proportion of that 10% consists entirely of professional real estate investors who already are familiar enough with real estate to handle things on their own. Those who sell their homes on their own are not only much more likely to accept a lower price than they could have received had they hired a realtor to sell their home, but they’re also much more likely to net less money than if they had hired a professional realtor, especially in today’s uncertain market with high inventory. When selling your home on your own, you alone are responsible for devising the correct marketing and advertising plan, and unless you have significant experience in the real estate business, you are unlikely to know the right plan. Much more importantly, unless you are a licensed real estate agent, you will not have access to what is called the Multiple Listing System, or MLS. The MLS allows home sellers to list their homes on a comprehensive database used by realtors and real estate agents all over Minnesota and all over America. The comprehensive system gives you access to a very wide market for very cheap. When selling your home on your own, your prospective buyers are limited to the readers and viewers of the advertisements you coordinate and purchase. By hiring a real estate agent or realtor and granting yourself access to the MLS, you are not only enabling your house to be viewed by many more prospective buyers, but by enabling more buyers, you are enabling your home to be listed for a higher price. And that’s just the beginning. A FSBO (for sale by owner) sign is practically an invitation for low offers. Investors and buyers will come expecting not just a great deal, but a steal. Those who sell their homes on their own will have to answer all the phone calls on their free time, arrange their own meetings, convincing buyers to come at a time when the seller is available, and convincing buyers to write the seller an offer. They have to determine which forms to get and where to get them and who to sign them, from banks to lawyers to others. Then they will have to determine if the buyers are qualified—but how? Do they have money in the bank, good credit—can they get a mortgage loan? Is the buyer’s loan officer competent? Is he flexible? There are many more challenges—from handling inspections to lawyers—but we won’t need to go into them. Selling a home is a profession, and requires its own set of skills and experience. Here at Buy Sell Lease Real Estate, we’re happy to cover the above details and challenges for you—it’s our profession, after all!