More and more homeowners are choosing flat fee MLS Services and realizing the growing popularity of retaining control of the selling process. With the economic decline and real estate prices falling, homeowners have opted to keep more money in their pocket and sell their homes on their own, without the assistance of a real estate agent. The good news is that the flat fee MLS service offers homeowners an inventive way of marketing their home to millions of homebuyers utilizing several concepts that real estate agents use everyday. With the flat fee MLS service, homeowners are able to utilize the premiere online real estate database that every realtor uses to locate homes for their clients. This shared computerized real estate database lists all the properties for sale in a geographical area. Traditionally used to enable real estate agents to publish and distribute information about available properties for sale, now-a-days this flat fee MLS service is available to homeowners to market their own homes to clients seeking to purchase properties. Why Pay a Commission when you could keep $30,000? To understand the advantages of flat fee MLS services you must first have a basic understanding of just what a real estate agent does during the transaction. A real estate agent agrees to act on your behalf to sell your home. This is formalized into a written buyer-broker or listing contract for an agreed upon number of days. In a nutshell, the agent will list your home in the MLS database, negotiate the purchase and help close the transaction. Now of course, this process has been condensed but in reality, the real estate agent provides marketing and advice; if you have any communication for the buyer, the real estate agent acts as the liaison to negotiate on your behalf. You get this full service for a 6% commission of the sales price. The Real Estate brokerages realize that homeowners have became educated in the home selling process and are unwilling to relinquish control of selling their home and give up a 6 percent commission. Why pay a realtor when you could sell your home by utilizing the flat fee MLS service and realize a gain of up to $30,000? One such innovative real estate brokerage, Urban Living Realty, a Baltimore, Maryland real estate company, developed a service for homeowners to pay an affordable flat fee but continue to reap the benefits of expert realtor advice. Many homeowners are now enjoying the benefit of keeping up to $30,000 in their pocket upon the sale of their home. In 2008, the average selling price of homes in Baltimore County was $303, 900. A 6% commission translates into $18,234 versus Urban Living Realty’s flat fee of $397 the homeowner could have paid. And out of 8,128 homes that were listed for sale only 1,062 homes sold at an average of 85 days on the market. Another advantage of flat fee MLS services is that you can market your home for a lower price (because of the commission savings) which can make the difference between whether your sell or NOT. These statistics are reasons flat fee MLS service has become so popular. Are there more Home sales than Hype? Absolutely! The flat fee MLS service allows you to list your home in the same database that thousands of realtors use to locate properties for their clients. In 2007 there were more than 120,000 properties that sold via the MLS real estate database which translated into more than $100 million in sales volume. Urban Living Realty of Baltimore Maryland has taken this affordable service a step farther by offering a-la-carte professional expert help where the homeowner can purchase additional professional services while still retaining the rights to sell without a realtor. This still translates into thousands of dollars saved. Additionally, by utilizing the flat fee MLS service you get more exposure on the Internet. Where a real estate agent may only list your home in the MLS real estate database, you also get the benefit of free advertising on supplementary realty websites like Realtor.com, Homesdatabase.com, Washingtonpost.com and other local and national newspapers. This added benefit of more than 10 million homebuyers reviewing your listing on a daily basis can mean a quick home sale. As you can see, the benefits of utilizing a flat fee MLS service are impressive and while there may be a challenge to selling your home yourself, any additional support can be customized. CLICK HERE TO START SAVING MONEY SELLING YOUR HOME TODAY
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