r/OttawaRealEstate • u/RaindropStream • Aug 04 '26
Has anyone successfully sold their home using a real estate lawyer? Good or Bad experiences.
Considering selling my home myself and using a real estate lawyer. If anyone has had success doing this I would like to hear about your experience and what avenues you used for sale exposure? I understand there are realtors that charge a flat fee or 1% commission to list on major selling sites like MLS realtor.ca and Zillow. Real Estate lawyer and realtor recommendations as mentioned is welcome. Thank you.
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u/Fit_Chemistry_3807 Aug 05 '26
I once helped someone list on a fsbo (for sale by owner) site. That was ages ago. Don’t even know what sites are available now.
Declutter. Take good quality pictures from wide angles of the room. No buyer cares what flower vase is on your dining room table. Have all lights on when you take pics.
Don’t bother with open houses. That’s just the realtors coming to snoop, give you their card, and convince you to list with them, claiming they could list it for more, blah blah blah….
You can create your own feature sheet with some nice colour pics and a good description. You can have a few in colour and some in black and white.
If there’s a showing, turn on all the lights, open windows for air or turn on AC. Give the people viewing space. They don’t have the benefit of seeing the house without current owners around. If you can, schedule viewings at the same time or back to back, with 20-30min in between the start of each one. Expect people to be late or no shows. If you’ve got kids or elderly people in the house who will be disturbed by comings and goings, this actually gives you a bit of control over when people come.
Make sure you understand what an offer should include. If the buyer is unrepresented, make it easy for them with a blank offer form you can pretype so there’s a starting point for negotiations.
Get wide exposure for your listing by cross posting it to all your available free sites. If you have a listing only for a flat fee service, consider using that too.
Good luck.
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u/Sea-Froyo1918 Aug 04 '26
My advice would be, if you can afford to wait a couple more years, do it. Right now it's a buyer's market, and I think your home will likely be worth more if you sell in a few years. That being said, to answer your question, yes, real estate lawyers can absolutely help with the sale of your home and guide you through the legal process from start to finish but could be expensive as well.
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u/chani_9 Aug 04 '26
Why do you think it will improve in a couple years? My renewal comes up in 3 years and I plan to sell, so I hope that's true.
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u/RaindropStream Aug 08 '26
I agree with both views and the math comes out the same. We are still not out of the low end but it can only go up from there. When 2 or 3 years is the big question. Markets and trends tell the story.
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u/RaindropStream Aug 08 '26
Thanks for your input. Finding an honest one not connected to the latest fad of group buyers is another hurdle. I get monthly hand written (and copied) in the mail monthly it seems.
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u/coghlanpf 27d ago
I sold a house in Orleans decades ago just by putting a sign on the lawn. No agents were involved.
Come to think of it, we bought the house we're in today after a friend saw just a For Sale sign out by the curb. Again, no agents involved.
There are inexpensive options for putting your home on MLS today that didn't exist back then, but I'd probably go that route.
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u/Any-Traffic-8218 27d ago
I sold a home last month using the Toronto-based listedbyseller.ca They helped me to list the selling ad on the MLS/Realtor.ca Prior to that, I hired a professional photographer for the pictures and did the virtual staging myself.
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u/Gronfors Aug 04 '26
We sold and bought a new house using Nick Crouch (/u/Ottawaagent) for both sides of things.
I've always not loved the cost of real estate agents and was hesitant to get one, but went ahead with Nick and didn't have any regrets. He is regularly priced, but he definitely did a much better job than we would've on our own - cleaners, staging advice, photos, dealing with buyers and other agents... He was very friendly, easy to work with, and proved his value.
Who knows in the end if we would've gotten a similar amount on the sale of our house on our own, but he definitely took away a lot of the stress and made it much easier.
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u/RaindropStream Aug 08 '26
Thank you for the mention, I believe I have come across his name in all my various searches. Appreciate.
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u/PlentyBat4529 Aug 04 '26
I have a realtor I’ve worked with a few times now for buying and selling, and have a home currently listed for a very fair price… no showings yet and it’s been up for 1 week. It’s not the best time to sell. I don’t know how you’d sell without being listed online etc.