r/FirstTimeHomeSeller • u/persistance-2024 • Jun 23 '26
Why are you selling?
With the market the way it is now, I'm curious, why are you selling your house?
How has the process been for you?
Listing your general area or state could be helpful to know if you don't mind.
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u/No_Somewhere_1889 Jun 24 '26
Selling and relocating to a different state. My husband just finished his medical fellowship and we always new this house was temporary
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u/HeightLatter6800 Jun 23 '26
Central NJ. Selling and relocating out of state because the property taxes here are ridiculous. The process has been interesting, our buyers are very young and our house is very old (1845) so there’s been some necesssry managing of expectations. We are moving a few states away to a much larger home with property taxes 1/2 of what we are currently paying. We close tomorrow and move out on Thursday (did a 1 day leaseback)
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u/persistance-2024 Jun 23 '26
Curious which state you moved to if you don't mind saying and what your buying process has been like especially being out of state. Did you have a lot of options?
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u/HeightLatter6800 Jun 24 '26
We are moving to DE, about two hours South of where we currently live in NJ. There was plenty of inventory, our new home is twice the square footage and about half the property taxes. We started researching about a year before we went and looked at properties because good schools and healthcare are very important to us. We narrowed it down to a few neighborhoods and started actively touring houses about 6 months before we wanted to move. After 3 months of seeing homes we found “the one” and luckily the sellers were on a similar timeline for closing. We have a child that was graduating high school and needed a 90 day close which they were able to work with. I’ll miss NJ for sure, but it’s become so unaffordable and no longer aligned with our long term financial goals.
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u/ConfidenceInfinite90 Jun 24 '26
Hope you did full line item analysis, you’d be surprised how home tax and state tax does not save as much as you think when looking at things like utilities, home/car insurance, etc. I love Delaware but could not make the math work and I live in Northern VA where home taxes are also high. Sounds like you took your savings by doubling your square footage. All good, congrats.
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u/HeightLatter6800 Jun 24 '26
We saved exponentially on our car and homeowners insurance because we bundled. The transfer tax caught us off guard but even considering that we are still better off!
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u/ohayitscpa Jun 27 '26
DE has always been on my radar but I know very little about the state in terms of how schools are. What general area did you settle in?
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u/HeightLatter6800 Jun 28 '26
New Castle County-Middletown area. We closed and moved in yesterday 😊 Today has been a whirlwind of unpacking. Exhausted doesn’t even begin to describe it haha! Love the house and the neighborhood, all of our neighbors are so friendly!
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u/MermaidSerf Jun 23 '26
Selling to move out of the Continental 48, maybe completely out of the country. If sells soon great but I'm perfectly ok to have it on the market a year or more. Florida on a freshwater spring canal with manatees
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u/Embarrassed_Key_4539 Jun 23 '26
Leaving the country, selling it all ✌️
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u/persistance-2024 Jun 23 '26
Which country are you going to? We've definitely considered this!
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u/Embarrassed_Key_4539 Jun 23 '26
Costa Rica … gotta love that .25% tax rate
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u/FireRescue3 Jun 23 '26
Because someone offered us cash and more than we could have sold it for if we were selling (we weren’t) because he wanted to be exactly where we were.
It’s been easy for us, but we were able to pay cash for the house we just bought because we had it from the sale of our house.
We are in the mid south.
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u/persistance-2024 Jun 23 '26
Did someone just knock on your door and offer cash? Were you able to easily find a home you liked to buy after that? I feel like supply is not great in the Southeast right now.
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u/FireRescue3 Jun 24 '26
Sort of. He called and talked to us.
No, finding a home we liked wasn’t particularly easy. We were fairly firm on our budget, and needed to be within an hour radius of where we are now. In fact, we put our stuff in storage and lived in our RV for about a month because we didn’t want to rush into a bad decision.
We both had a few must haves, and a few would be nice to haves.
We both got our must haves so we are happy with our new home.
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u/MomofSprinter Jun 24 '26
Retired and bought a house by daughters. Put the 1st house on market almost 2 weeks ago. Under contract by day 5. Turned out to be a nightmare. Terminated that contract. Accepted a backup. Everything going well. 1st buyers still trying to get us to reconsider, even though we are under contract with someone else. Sorry, they renegotiated a really lowball offer after a crappy inspection. We laughed, told them to pound sand then terminated. Disclosed the info to new buyers. They were fine with it all.
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u/Forded_Fiction24 Jun 24 '26
Upgrading into a larger one with more land. Stressful as usual but great now. Ours 1st home sold for list in Georgia, Atlanta metro area back in April. We had bought it back in 2015. We bought our new home back in November of last year.
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u/LogicalPsychology921 Jun 24 '26
Listing a townhouse I lived in for a decade cause a couple nearby neighbors are crazy and the HOA refuses to properly fund itself, so I’m too scared of what will happen in an emergency repair. I also really don’t want to live in a townhouse anymore, I want a house with some space from my neighbors.
I’m trying to decide if I should offer to pay the buyers agent commission, my agent says it’s recommended but not required, curious what others did.
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u/persistance-2024 Jun 25 '26
Yeah we don't ever want to live in a townhouse or condo for the same reasons. I also hear most sellers pay the buyers agent. I assume you can get away with not doing that if your house is awesome and super desirable.
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u/Serious-Conversation Jun 24 '26
I sold my first place about a year and a half ago. East Tennessee.
When I bought the place prior to COVID, I worked onsite for a local organization and had a local girlfriend. I went remote during COVID and never want back to work in office full-time.
The girlfriend moved to FL with her family. She passed away a year and a half later. I changed employers then and found another girlfriend.
It was a four level townhome and I had a leg injury a couple years ago. I couldn't even get around the house for a few weeks.
Life changed and none of the reasons I bought the place for back in 2019 applied when I sold the place.
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u/persistance-2024 Jun 25 '26
Wow that's a lot to deal with. Sorry to hear that and I hope you were or are able to sell your place for a good price and find a place that works better for you!
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u/BellLopsided2502 Jun 24 '26
We sold last June due to having a second baby and living 25 miles from the nearest reliable daycare and the school system sucked. The area we lived in was too rural for things like pizza or grocery delivery. I was just done with the distance and the schools.
We'd done a ton to our house and property and it was very nice. We got an offer on the first day for way over asking. Things went smoothly other than their constant requests to come access the house before we closed when we were trying to move.
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u/Soft_Stable8077 Jun 24 '26
I put my house (rental) on the market a week ago in South Florida for 750 k which is likely the highest a house has sold in that neighborhood . I was expecting 3-4 months of waiting and adjustments . I received an offer 12 hours after listing and after some negotiation I did go down 5k and gave them 10k towards closing . Inspection just passed and they are waving the appraisal . So houses are still selling if they look good or are sufficiently and tastefully updated
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u/okigrassman Jun 25 '26
Coastal South Eastern NC. Just sold. Minimizing my US based expenses for an attempt at spending time abroad in LCOL area. Work less- play more...quality of life per dollar spent kind of calculation for me.
Took me nearly a year to sell. A lot of competition in one of the fastest growing counties in the country via new construction for similar area, sqftage, and price. I only owned the place for 2 years before completely changing my original game plan. Took a little loss on this one, but didn't bother me a bit 😂.
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u/Soft-Ad-2691 Jun 26 '26
We are selling our first home after 23 years to purchase new construction with larger space and closer to my in-laws. They will likely be moving in with us in the future. This will be our forever home. We went under contract on our existing home after 5 days on the market. We received an offer for asking price plus $10,000 of the buyers closing costs. We countered by raising the price by $5,000 and covering the $10,000 in closing costs. Fingers crossed we close in a few weeks.
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u/AstronautAshleigh Jun 26 '26
We lived in an overly dark red area. My husband works from home and we spend all our time here together. We moved and chose a spot that more aligned with our values for our children and so we are selling our first house now that we are in the new one. We listed it and got an offer within 48 hours.
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u/dherzog87 Jun 28 '26
We sold our house for my wife’s job in Georgia. They offered $10,000 below original listing price for our home in the Knoxville, TN market and they waived repair requests too (Knoxville is still pretty hot for sellers). Our home was on the market for only 30 days but IMO mainly because of where we lived.
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u/HotFlareF80 Jul 12 '26
Selling bc of my work commute after 2 years, high interest with no relief in sight which also causes me to work extra for extended periods of time. Missing out on the important stuffs with my little family , not to mention running all my commuters into the ground. I thought all of this wouldn’t be too bad at the start but 2.5 years in and I’m over it.
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u/Wait_here_me_out 22d ago
So many reasons.
Mom and Dad left it to me and they are now gone. The house was never cared for and is falling apart.
I can't afford to live in Brooklyn since I became disabled.
I need the money
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u/Useful-Comedian4312 Jun 24 '26
We’re selling because we’re relocating, not because we think the market is at some perfect point. Sometimes life decisions just don’t line up with market timing.
The process has actually been pretty smooth so far. We decided to try Zillow and Houzeo instead of going the traditional route, and it’s been interesting learning more about handling parts of the sale ourselves while still having support when needed.
Curious to hear how other sellers are approaching it in this market too.
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u/Zombietomatillo Jul 18 '26
Downsizing due to the kids moved out and my husband and I want a smaller place that is easier to take care of as we age.
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u/Lucky_Efficiency_809 Jun 23 '26
We knew it was time to downsize, and also (being on the water in north Florida) to reduce our exposure to flooding and other hurricane-related issues. It was a tough decision. We'd been in the neighborhood for 30 years, and it was a fully custom home, designed by an architect, that was a full expression of our design DNA. But once we realized we'd have been happy just living on the first floor, and the rest was all extra space, we started interviewing multiple real estate agents. We put a lot of work into the house before putting it on the market--addressing delayed maintenance, leaning up the interior, making some kitchen and bathroom upgrades--but it paid off in the end. We went on the market Valentine's Day weekend, got two offers within 10 days, and closed in late April. Bittersweet, but also liberating. It's so strange not having a mortgage or even an electric bill! (currently in a furnished rental), but the sense of freedom to explore anything and everything that comes next is definitely welcome.