Resources / Homebuyer Education / Before You Buy / Buying a Home-to-Sell Contingency
A home-to-sell contingency allows you to make an offer on a new home while selling your current home. In this situation, the purchase is contingent upon the sale of your current property. Contracts will specify how much time is allowed for the sale to close, and if your home doesn’t sell within that time frame, you can cancel the contract without losing money. Since this contingency means you need to sell your existing home fast, let’s look at some things that can help move the process along quickly.
Buy Down Your Buyer's Interest Rate
A seller-paid rate buydown may help reduce your buyer’s monthly payments without lowering your home’s price, which may make the property more attractive. The seller pays money to a lender up front, lowering the buyer’s interest rate and payment for a defined period of time. Doing so allows you as a seller to get a hesitant buyer off the fence while preserving your profit margin by avoiding a price reduction on your home.
Cover Your Buyer’s Closing Costs
Another option to consider is providing funds to help cover your buyer’s closing costs. This gives your buyer immediate savings. Let’s say you listed your home a month ago and haven’t yet received any serious offers. As an incentive, you edit the listing to include a $4,000 seller credit. This may be preferable to lowering your asking price, which may cause buyers to suspect the price cut is due to a property issue uncovered during an inspection.
Selling to an iBuyer
Many people today are choosing to sell to iBuyers, or instant buyers. iBuyers are companies that purchase homes in a quick cash transaction, make any necessary improvements, and resell it. This route allows you to speed up the financing process, since they offer quick, flexible closing dates, and to avoid having to make repairs. Working with an iBuyer may be worthwhile if you want to sell your home as fast as possible, don’t want to repair or stage the property for potential buyers, and don’t want people touring a home you’re still living in.
Working with a Real Estate Agent to Sell Your Home
It’s generally helpful to engage the services of a licensed real estate agent to sell your home. Their experience is valuable not only for the home sale itself, but in helping you stage and market the home to make it attractive to buyers. Here are a few important elements in developing a strategy to sell your home.

Pricing Your Home
Your real estate agent will run a comparable market analysis to figure out what similar homes in your area are selling for, allowing you to price your home competitively.

Staging Your Home
Staging means positioning your home to help buyers envision it as a place they want to live. This includes decluttering, arranging furniture thoughtfully, incorporating tasteful design elements and décor, and even changing lighting or fragrances in your home to create a welcoming ambience.

Marketing Your Home
A real estate agent will typically market your home as well. This involves many elements, including:
  • Taking high-quality photos
  • Writing an appealing listing description
  • Including a virtual tour
  • Posting on major real estate sites
  • Using both social media and traditional ads
  • Hosting open houses

A home-to-sell contingency allows you to start the process of buying your new home while selling your old home, and there are lots of steps you can take to help sell your home faster. Remember, the faster you sell your current home, the sooner you'll be in your new home. So get started!