Anyone with experience selling their home to iBuyer (Chicago, Time: sale, real estate)

[Lucky0123]

Does anyone has experience with any iBuyer (Instant offer/Cash offer) to sell your home in Chicago Area. Who are the key players in Chicago market? It seems none of the big players like Zillow, Opendoor etc. are in Chicago, yet!

Finally I'm curious to know what are their average fees compare to Traditional RE agent Commission?

[BOBNCHI]

The pandemic didn't do them any favors.

https://chicagoagentmagazine.com/202...or-now-ibuyer/

[OPRFmama]

They make it sound really attractive like you’re saving tons of $ on fees and commissions, but please read all the fine print and deductions. Lots of sneaky ways they make you think you’re winning, but clearly they are, or they wouldn’t be doing this... I encourage you to talk with a few Realtors and find out about their pricing recommendations, marketing strategies, etc. with the market being so hot in many places, you’ll likely come out way ahead by listing on the MLS and maximizing your exposure.

[Prestonator]

Originally Posted by Lucky0123

Does anyone has experience with any iBuyer (Instant offer/Cash offer) to sell your home in Chicago Area. Who are the key players in Chicago market? It seems none of the big players like Zillow, Opendoor etc. are in Chicago, yet!

Finally I'm curious to know what are their average fees compare to Traditional RE agent Commission?

You will have many people, especially real estate agents, who will be quick to jump on these threads and discredit iBuyers --typically pointing to lowball offers, hidden or excessive fees, repair cost "gotchas" etc. While that may be and is perhaps likely the case with a good number of them, you need to judge each iBuyer and each individual offer on its own merits.

I'm in the NC market and I can tell you I absolutely got what I believe to be a very fair offer to sell my home to Opendoor and indeed, after doing extensive comparisons with going the traditional list with a real estate agent, we sold to Opendoor for the following reasons:

1. The final offer was very fair relative even to the crazy market we are experiencing. My final selling price was within a $1,000 of the top end of the initial listing price recommended by my real estate agent. The agent did later indicate that new comps could push the listing price higher, but going much higher would have been a real stretch--even in this market. Our home was built in 1986 and it was by no means a "turn key" property. Our very modestly-sized kitchen, extremely outdated master bath and stunningly small master closets, along with a number of aging problems requiring near-term fixes, do not match favorably with houses listed in our price range.

2. Selling fees were not excessive, nor were there any repair "gotchas." Selling fee was 5% and all fees combined came in at less than 6%, even factoring in repairs. My repairs came in at just $2,300--and I can promise you a typical home buyer would have expected more concessions than that. So, so much for all those reports of double digit percentage fees--at least in my case. In fact, I recovered all the repair charges by negotiating for an additional $3K contract addendum to my deal. So, frankly, I feel pretty darn good about it.

3. And no, I'm not an idiot--I recognize that if my assertions about the pricing limitations of my home are not 100% correct, I left "some money on the table." But, in my view, even in the best-case traditional real estate route scenario, selling my home to Opendoor this way was well worth the potential trade off. NO STAGING, NO UPDATING, NO HOME VISITORS (and thus not trying to figure out what to do with the dog, keep the house clean, etc.), NO WORRIES about what my home will ACTUALLY sell for; NO WORRIES about how long it might take to sell, etc. THE CONVENIENCE AND GUARANTEED SALE were worth it for us.

At the end of the day, every situation and risk-reward evaluation is going to be different. Not all iBuyers are created equal--not by a long shot! For example, another iBuyer, Offerpad, offered me a woefully low and highly insulting price for my home. So always remember your MMV. Ultimately, depending on what butters your bread, we are all subject to confirmation bias. We can always go find an anecdote to support your preferred view and narrative. In the case of Real estate agents, whom I deeply respect, they are understandably worried about the paradigm disruption of iBuyers and how much that might infringe on their marketshare. (Otherwise, they wouldn't feel the need to devote so much energy to discrediting them.) Time will tell if Opendoor becomes a sustainable, viable business model. At a minimum, it's worth your time to investigate the merits of Opendoor.

It's obviously not the route for everyone, but I'm happy with how it worked out for me.

[Gemini1963]

Originally Posted by Prestonator

You will have many people, especially real estate agents, who will be quick to jump on these threads and discredit iBuyers --typically pointing to lowball offers, hidden or excessive fees, repair cost "gotchas" etc. While that may be and is perhaps likely the case with a good number of them, you need to judge each iBuyer and each individual offer on its own merits.

I'm in the NC market and I can tell you I absolutely got what I believe to be a very fair offer to sell my home to Opendoor and indeed, after doing extensive comparisons with going the traditional list with a real estate agent, we sold to Opendoor for the following reasons:

1. The final offer was very fair relative even to the crazy market we are experiencing. My final selling price was within a $1,000 of the top end of the initial listing price recommended by my real estate agent. The agent did later indicate that new comps could push the listing price higher, but going much higher would have been a real stretch--even in this market. Our home was built in 1986 and it was by no means a "turn key" property. Our very modestly-sized kitchen, extremely outdated master bath and stunningly small master closets, along with a number of aging problems requiring near-term fixes, do not match favorably with houses listed in our price range.

2. Selling fees were not excessive, nor were there any repair "gotchas." Selling fee was 5% and all fees combined came in at less than 6%, even factoring in repairs. My repairs came in at just $2,300--and I can promise you a typical home buyer would have expected more concessions than that. So, so much for all those reports of double digit percentage fees--at least in my case. In fact, I recovered all the repair charges by negotiating for an additional $3K contract addendum to my deal. So, frankly, I feel pretty darn good about it.

3. And no, I'm not an idiot--I recognize that if my assertions about the pricing limitations of my home are not 100% correct, I left "some money on the table." But, in my view, even in the best-case traditional real estate route scenario, selling my home to Opendoor this way was well worth the potential trade off. NO STAGING, NO UPDATING, NO HOME VISITORS (and thus not trying to figure out what to do with the dog, keep the house clean, etc.), NO WORRIES about what my home will ACTUALLY sell for; NO WORRIES about how long it might take to sell, etc. THE CONVENIENCE AND GUARANTEED SALE were worth it for us.

At the end of the day, every situation and risk-reward evaluation is going to be different. Not all iBuyers are created equal--not by a long shot! For example, another iBuyer, Offerpad, offered me a woefully low and highly insulting price for my home. So always remember your MMV. Ultimately, depending on what butters your bread, we are all subject to confirmation bias. We can always go find an anecdote to support your preferred view and narrative. In the case of Real estate agents, whom I deeply respect, they are understandably worried about the paradigm disruption of iBuyers and how much that might infringe on their marketshare. (Otherwise, they wouldn't feel the need to devote so much energy to discrediting them.) Time will tell if Opendoor becomes a sustainable, viable business model. At a minimum, it's worth your time to investigate the merits of Opendoor.

It's obviously not the route for everyone, but I'm happy with how it worked out for me.

This is a very interesting post that makes many excellent points. It's great to read someone's good experience. I think our house is similar to how you describe yours -- it has worked very well for us but it won't be "turn-key" in the eyes of prospective buyers. And your list of the selling hassles under #3 is SO familiar.

Thanks for the post.