We Buy Houses in Richmond

It’s no secret that selling your house ranks as one of life’s most stressful experiences. Americans have rated selling a home as more stressful than buying a home, planning a wedding, potty training a toddler, or even teaching a teenager to drive. Sellers worry about getting a good price, offers falling through, selling in time, and performing all the renovations needed to list the house.

It doesn’t have to be that way. Here at Express Homebuyers, we buy houses in Richmond, Virginia for cash, usually in seven days or less, without all the hassle of renovating, listing, and negotiating a sale price. Life is full of stressors–selling your home doesn’t have to be one of them.

Sell Your House for
Cash in Richmond

When you need to sell your house in Richmond fast, we’re ready to buy it! We buy houses in Virginia from downtown to Bon Air, and from The Fan to West Point. And the condition of your home doesn’t matter.

Foundation problems? That’s not a problem for us. Or are you looking to avoid foreclosure because you fell behind on mortgage payments. We all fall behind, and that doesn’t mean you have to lose everything. We’ve got your back! We’re a local Virginia based company that understands your needs.

When you sell your house in Richmond to us, you are in control. You decide when we close the deal, and once we reach an agreement you are happy with, you can get cash up front to help with moving expenses and get the debt collectors off your back. With an A+ rating from the BBB, and thousands of homeowners helped, we buy houses in Richmond so people just like you can get a fresh start. Call us at (877) 804-5252 for your hassle-free quote today.

What Makes a Traditional Home Sale So Stressful?

There is a reason that three-quarters of Americans think selling a house is extremely stressful. Not only does it take a significant amount of time, but preparing to sell a home costs a fair bit of money upfront.

If you have the means, skills, and time to sell your home the traditional way, we aren’t trying to stop you. However, we do want you to have the information to make the decision that is best for you. Here is what it takes to sell a house using the traditional method. (Note that these are all stressors you would avoid by selling your home for cash in Richmond):

Hiring a Realtor

You’ll need to find a realtor who knows the Richmond neighborhoods and housing markets. It needs to be someone you trust, someone with experience, and someone who isn’t too busy to prioritize your home. Once you sell your home, you will owe realtor fees–usually 6% of the sale price.

Repairing and Renovating

Even if you don’t plan to conduct any major renovations, most houses need at least a little bit of refreshing and repair if you want to sell them for a good price. At a minimum, you’ll need to fill nail holes, patch cracks, touch up paint, address leaks, and replace light bulbs.

If your house is on the older side, you might consider renovating and updating. However, you’ll have to carefully weigh the cost benefits. Some upgrades might increase the value of your home, but it is always a gamble.

Staging

No matter how great the size, location, and layout of your home may be, you’ll have a hard time attracting buyers if it doesn’t make a good first impression. This means a lot of work repairing, cleaning, and even bringing in updated furniture and decor.

These days, potential buyers’ first interaction with your home is probably via pictures in an online listing. The number and quality of photos have a considerable impact on how quickly a home sells. For this reason, many sellers choose to hire professionals to photograph their house prior to listing it.

If your photos intrigue potential buyers, they’ll come to your house for a tour or an open house. That means that your house needs to look picture-perfect before photographs, and it needs to stay that way so that you are ready to show it at a moment’s notice. Be prepared to scrub your bathrooms, dust your baseboards and blinds, and get your kitchen sparkling clean. Then keep it that way for the next month or so while you wait for your house to sell.

Decluttering and Purging

Realtors know that simplified houses sell better. Rooms look bigger, and houses look cleaner with fewer things. If you have a lot of stuff, you are going to need to declutter. You’ll need to sift through your possessions and decide what to trash, what to donate, and what to keep.

If your furniture is outdated, your realtor might provide some more modern decor for the purpose of staging your house. That means you will need somewhere to store your extra possessions and your furniture. Many sellers rent a storage unit to move their stuff into during the selling process.

Waiting Game

The housing market in Richmond currently favors sellers, but you can still expect to wait about 20 days for your house to go under contract and then another 30 days or so before you can finally close. You might get lucky and sell your house quickly, but you might also get stuck waiting for weeks or even months.

Negotiating Offers

Once a potential buyer makes an offer on your house, you still have to negotiate. If there are multiple offers, you will have to decide between them or try to play them off of each other. In a housing negotiation, almost everything can be bargained. You will have to negotiate the selling price, closing costs, timeline, contingencies, repairs, and financing.

Inspections

After a potential buyer agrees to purchase the home, it goes under contract while financing is worked out and time is given for inspections. Prospective buyers will frequently pay for a home inspection to identify any issues such as plumbing leaks, cracks in the foundation, HVAC parts that need to be replaced, an aging roof, or termite damage. If the inspection reveals any problems, the buyer will generally ask you to perform necessary repairs or lower the selling price accordingly.

Closing Costs

When you are finally ready to finalize the sale, be prepared to pay the requisite closing costs. This generally involves realtor fees, recording fees, and transfer taxes.

Cleaning Out and Moving

Before you can lock the door and drive away, you’ll have to make sure that everything is cleaned up and ready for the next owner. You’ve packed the boxes and loaded the truck. Now, you just need to clean out the appliances, address the stain on the carpet, scrub the toilets, and take out the trash.

If this sounds like a daunting task, you are not wrong. If you love home repairs and have the time and energy to prepare a house for selling, the traditional method might be the way to go. But you should know that there is another way–a way to sell your home without the headache of a traditional listing.

Express Homebuyers is not a real estate agent, and we don’t sell your house in the same way. We buy houses in Richmond, VA, and pay you in cash right away, no matter the condition of your home. You can have cash in hand in just around seven days without the hassle of listing your home or using a real estate agent.

Will I Lose Money Selling My House for Cash?

If you go the traditional route of listing and selling your house with a real estate agent, you might be asking yourself if you can get a higher price that way. And if so, why would you decide to sell your house to Express Homebuyers for cash instead?

The answer is pretty simple–selling your house for cash saves you countless hours of work, you don’t have to spend any money upfront, and you avoid all the stress and hassle of listing a home. If you want cash quickly without any headaches, we are the solution for you.

You might not be aware of all of the expenses involved in selling a home. While the selling price for a traditional sale might be higher than your cash offer, you need to take into account what you will actually walk away with. Here are some expenses you may not have considered:

Buying Decor or Furniture for Staging

Sometimes, realtors will have furniture you can borrow to stage a home, but not always. Even if they do, you still might want to purchase some decor pieces, tablecloths, flowers, or throw pillows so that your home looks modern and inviting.

Hiring Cleaning Professionals

At a minimum, most sellers will want to get their carpets cleaned before they list the house. Given the amount of work required to prepare for showing a home, many sellers opt to hire professional cleaners to make sure everything looks spick and span.

Addressing Issues Found in the Inspection

If the home inspection ordered by the potential buyer reveals any issues, you will have to pay to fix them prior to closing, or the selling price will be adjusted accordingly. If your home needs a new roof, if there are cracks in the foundation, or if your HVAC system is on its last leg, those issues could cost you thousands of dollars.

Realtor Commission

It is a common practice for the seller to be responsible for the commissions for both the buyer’s and the seller’s realtors. Usually, the realtors’ commissions are 6% of the selling price. The median selling price for a home in Richmond is $350,000. The commission you owe for selling that home would be $21,000.

Closing Costs

Aside from the realtor commission, selling a home comes with other fees. These include property taxes, transfer taxes, attorney fees, and title insurance. We can’t get you out of your taxes, but when you sell your home for cash with our Richmond homebuyers, the fees you pay will be significantly reduced.

Paying the Mortgage While You Wait to Sell

If you are living in the home you are trying to sell, this doesn’t matter as much. However, if you are carrying two mortgages–either because you already bought a new house or because you are trying to sell a rental property–continuing to pay the mortgage while you wait for your home to sell is a significant cost.

On average, homes in Richmond are on the market for 26 days. Once your house is under contract, you’ll have to wait another month or more before you can close. That’s at least two months of mortgage payments you’ll avoid if you sell your house for cash.