How SmartSeller™ Works

Let's Chat — Begin by calling, texting or filling out a quick contact form to determine if this method is the best route for you and the sale or lease option purchase of your home. After we visit for a bit, we will both know if this is a good fit that will realize the most return on your investment and if you and your property are good candidates for selling in just 7 days. Together, we will review your goals for selling and if your property (and you) are really ready for a sale. Sometimes, you might be, but your home needs a little (or a lot of) help to show your property in its best possible light. Your Personal Home Care Coordinator will guide you there too (more on that in Step 3). In getting the most value for both, you as the seller, and I as your agent, we must be on the same page with what your expectations are... that's why Step 1 is so important to you as a seller. The time we invest here... information gathering, answering questions and deciding expectations will reward us both during and after the sale is complete. If after we chat we mutually decide you may be better served by a different selling method, we shake hands and part friends. At the very least, you will have learned a great wealth of information that you can apply to your final decision to sell. Otherwise we complete a listing agreement and move on to Step 2.

Educated & Engaged — We feel you should not only know what's going on with your sale... but to understand the entire process in a simple and engaging way. It's our goal to see you through the sale, start to finish and it's important that you stay updated, educated and engaged throughout the process. Think you may be too busy to learn and stay engaged? We make it easy and streamlined with regular updates from your Personal Home Care Coordinator. Remember that the whole selling process takes just 7 days... make some time for one of the most important financial transactions you will make in your lifetime... selling your house. Above all... Studies show that engaged sellers sell their property as much as 30% faster than their competition. As a SmartSeller™ your role will be:
1. Spend the necessary time and money preparing your home for sale.
2. Work with me on determining your Initial Opening Bid Price and learning our Risk Free Method of selling your house.
3. Stay by your phone during the 2 Day Public Inspection, just in case I need a quick question answered and to update you on how things are going.

Staging & Preparation — In Step 3, we'll be working together to prepare your property for sale. You will work with me and coordinate specifics with our Personal Home Care Coordinator assigned to your property. Although you and your available family members will be doing the labor to prepare your property... your Personal Home Care Coordinator will be able to give you many useful tips, tricks and ideas on how to accomplish seemingly difficult tasks with ease and benefit by speeding this process to a house that is not only ready to sell, but is now ready to show in its best possible light. Since many folks use service providers, such as house cleaners, painters and landscapers to prepare their homes for sale, you should budget some funds for such services. Best if you budget at least $500, however, up to several thousand dollars may be needed if your home needs a lot of work or you don't have much time to spend doing the labor yourself. Your Personal Home Care Coordinator will provide recommendations for local service providers. We do not accept referral fees from any of the service providers, so our only interest is in getting good results in a timely fashion. Your Personal Home Care Coordinator will have a complete checklist to go over the details of staging and preparation as well.

Fair Market Value & Marketing — One of the real advantages to a properly run 7 Day Sale campaign is that the buyers will determine what current fair market value is... meaning that the property can realize its fair market value during the round robin bidding process. Much confusion has been made about how one arrives at Fair Market Value. Here... we are going to look to a partial definition from Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia: "A fair market value is often an estimate of what a willing buyer would pay to a willing seller, both in a free market, for an asset or any piece of property. If such a transaction actually occurs, then the actual transaction price is usually the fair market value. Note that the opinion of people that are not interested in buying or selling an asset has little meaning, because they are not active in the market. Thus, "market value" (which is the same for everyone in the market) is not identical to the "intrinsic value" that different individuals may place on the same asset based on their own preferences and circumstances." (for the entire definition from Wikipedia, please click here) We initially price your house very aggressively for our advertisements that will be running during the 7 day sale. (more about the advertising and marketing below) While some would see a 7 day sale as an opportunity to pick up a property 'dirt cheap', many of these sales actually arrive at or close to the fair market value of the property being offered. By the definition above, if the 7 Day Sale campaign has been properly run, and the seller is able to generate a winning bid from the buyer that the seller would accept... where neither the buyer nor the seller is under any 'duress', then Fair Market Value has been realized.

The Marketing of your house is done in a simple, yet effective fashion over 5 days of the 7 day sale. During these 5 days, we have in place the following marketing advertisements:
1. Radio advertising on both Jack FM (Salt Lake City) and KNYN (99.1 FM) with enough daily repetition to generate local interest.
2. Local newspaper advertising strategically placed in the Uinta County Herald for both the Tuesday and Friday editions.
3. Online advertising of your home sale in popular classified websites such as Craigslist, KSL.com, and others to generate interest from all around our Intermountain region to buyers looking to own property in the Evanston, Wyoming area.
Unlike much of the marketing today... we measure each and every response to our ads by tracking and logging the calls. You see... the advertisements purposely do not have the street address of the property. Interested buyers must contact us in order to get the address and directions if needed. In doing so, we know how effective our advertising & marketing efforts are first hand, and we know just how many respondents we are generating. If by the end of Thursday night... we don't have at a minimum of 25 responses, we will postpone the sale and re-evaluate why before moving ahead. Again, if we have all done the above process correctly, including the beginning advertised price of the property... we will have at least 25 responses by Thursday evening.

The 2 Day Inspection — This is one of the most active parts of the entire process. We actually host a glorified open house. When buyers first approach the house… everything should look neat. The lawn should be mowed, or the walks and driveways shoveled. Flower beds, weed free. Shrubbery and trees trimmed. No bicycles or junk lying around. Once people enter the home, they should immediately feel welcome… it’s owners are people of great taste and care about the property (like themselves). The home should be uncluttered and exceptionally clean as previously covered with your Personal Home Care Coordinator. The attic should be organized and the basement aired out if necessary. These are all little things that make a HUGE impact. We give you a complete list of what needs done before this day in our StageList™. Cookies are warming in the oven. There are no other distractions. Remember it’s just for two days!

We put up all the bright printed signs to help buyers navigate through the property. Room sizes. What stays and what goes. All done in advance with bright signage. Our job is to point out special features and benefits of the property, answer questions and eventually solicit bids. All the information sheets are out on a table, where we assist buyers by assembling a packet for them to take with. A professional property inspection report of major systems is available along with a full disclosure of the properties imperfections, so buyers can bid with confidence and we can all sleep that night knowing that we have given buyers enough information that they may feel comfortable leaving a non-binding bid. All pets are out of the house. We have eliminated distractions, so that everything is made easy for buyers, including parking helpers if necessary.

All of our people are in place with specific duties, such as greeting, passing out information, answering questions, etc. It’s an organized and efficient event, albeit, relaxed and comfortable for buyers to inspect.

Greeters point out the SmartSeller™ Real Estate Agent at the exit, asking buyers to say good-bye on their way out. Allowing people to roam freely through the property inspecting all they need to see, however we do it in such a way as to direct them back to our exit, where the SmartSeller™ Real Estate Agent is waiting encouraging folks to leave a bid and answer any remaining questions, ensuring that they understand the bidding procedure. Some will say they’re not interested and leave. Most will be interested enough to hear the explanation and look at the bidding sheet. We are completely honest about the process and we feel this is the best way to conduct the sale. The SmartSeller™ Real Estate Agent finishes up with explaining how the Round-Robin will work so they can get an opportunity to get in the round-robin bidding process so they may have a fair chance to buy this house at a very fair price. Once again, these bids are non-binding and only serve as assurance to the person leaving a bid that they will receive a phone call from us Saturday night, providing them an opportunity to continue in the bidding process for the house if they so choose..

Round Robin Bidding — The 2 Day Open Inspection begins on the second day, Saturday, at 10:00 AM and we continue until 5:00 PM, where we close down the property inspection process. Up until that point, buyers will ask us over and over if we will really take the best offer on our bidding sheets. Our answer is always consistently the same over and over... the seller will take the best acceptable offer we get as of Saturday night as long as we meet reserve price. This is the true answer because... if 100 people come through the house and the final bid meets reserve, but is less than hoped for, then the house isn't worth as much as you had desired. Take what you can get - it's a fair bid. To that point... we can always count on people to behave in their own best interests. No one will let someone else walk away with a bargain they want for themselves. Each buyer wants to be the owner at the lowest possible price. If we start at a ridiculously low price, then that price plus $500 is still ridiculously low, and someone will bid it up. This is evidenced every single day on the most used bidding site around - eBay. This process will continue until the price gets to a reasonable range. Then the bargain hunters start dropping out, leaving the real buyers to bid up the price against each other.

Beginning at 6:00 PM, I start calling all buyers who left bids, to determine who will pay the most for the home. This process continues and by 9:00 PM Saturday night... we will have received an offer from a willing buyer for the most money any active buyer is willing to pay for the house on the date we have offered if for sale. This always boils down to the 3 'real buyers' that remain in the final round-robin bidding process.

And of those 3... one will shine as the top bidder only separated by $500 to the next top bidder in case something happens to the top bidder that prevents him from closing on the house. The beauty of this is of course... if for any reason the high bidder's financing falls through or for some other reason, they cannot close on the house, then we have a backup buyer ready to put up their earnest money and finish the purchase of the property.

We then call all of the remaining bidders and let them know the sale is over to the highest bidder and the amount it sold for. We also continue to stay in contact with these other high bidders just in case we need to go back to them and have them honor their bid as a backup buyer. We stay in contact to keep these folks updated as to the progress on the purchase all the way to close. If for some reason the highest bid offer does not meet reserve price... we simply move the property on the following Monday to the MLS QuikSale™ method and continue aggressively to sell your home as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Contract & Closing — Day 7 - Monday. First thing Monday morning, we draw up the purchase agreement, and necessary disclosure statements for all parties to sign. The contract includes such things as the amount of sale, timing of sale, funds transfer, what is included and excluded from the sale, title conveyance, taxes, assessments and fees to be apportioned, insurance responsibility, condition of premises, obligations in case of default and any other items that may in any way become part of the sale. After signing is completed and earnest money deposit received, we make contact with the settlement agent, who will assist us in the final closing details in a manner typical for all houses sold in our market area, including holding the earnest money in Escrow. This part of the transaction is the same as if you had sold your house using traditional methods. We handle all of the details to close the deal. Your Personal Home Care Coordinator will stay in contact with you to assure a smooth closing transaction. We work in concert with the Title Agent to ascertain that the lender's instructions have been satisfied and follow up with all the parties involved. This greatly alleviates most any problems that arise before the closing. All documents are expedited to the lender along with recorded deed and the title policy to the buyer.

72 hours prior to closing... your Personal Home Care Coordinator will make contact with the title agent to review any remaining items that need to be addressed. Sometimes things popup at the last minute and we work to get them resolved quickly. We then move into action on any other items that may stall the closing to eliminate them. This seems like a simple thing, however, you would be surprised at how often this step is not taken and everyone shows up at a closing only to find out... we can't close!
After the funds have kicked in and the checks have been dispersed... the keys handed to the new owner... and everyone is happy... it's time to celebrate all of our successes with a nice lunch or dinner. We use this time to recap the highlights and to gather feedback about the entire experience, and how or where we could have improved on our service. We end with a toast and a congratulations and hope that we can work together again at some point in the future.