A Guide to Selling Your Parents’ House

Selling your parents’ home is often a little more emotional than other home sales. Mom or dad may have recently passed away. Or maybe they are now in a long term care facility. Maybe one or both parents is trying to get or has already gotten accepted by Medicaid, and lawyer is telling you all these things you need to do. And to complicate it more, maybe you are left all on your own because your siblings live too far away to help. Here’s how to help you move forward.

First

Once it is known the house will be sold, go to the home and pack up any financially or sentimentally valuable items. Get those out of the house. Give the home a good cleaning. Do some pack, too. Homes sell better when buyers can see the space. Do not remove all of the furniture, though. Furnished homes often sell better than unfurnished homes.

Second

Elect who will be the decision maker. Trust documents or a will may have already done this for you. If those documents do exist and have multiple people in charge of selling the home, consider amongst yourselves to elect one as the decision maker. This will help a lot once you start engaging with professionals and are in the midst of a transaction.

Third

Discuss among the stakeholders such as a surviving spouse or your siblings what is needed or wanted from the home sale. What is most important? It might be to get the highest price, or to get the sale done quickly, or to minimize costs during the transaction. It is likely a combination of these things. Once this is decided, start working with a real estate agent.

Selecting a real estate agent can be difficult. There are several methods you can use to filter through agents to find the best fit. You can ask about an agent’s experience in these circumstances and how he or she will market the home. A good agent should be interviewing you as much as you are interviewing him or her. Look for an agent who asks a lot of questions and provides information about the different strategies for selling the home.

Events During the Sale Process

Lastly, there are two events during the sale process which seem to cause the most concern and angst amongst children selling their parents’ home. The first is the seller’s disclosures. It may be the case you have not lived in the home for years or maybe never lived there. You may know very little. That’s okay. Just do your best. Your agent should help with understanding your obligations, which is to be honest. If you don’t know anything because you never lived in or haven’t for years, just write this into the disclosure.

The other item families often struggle with is the home inspection and buyer’s response. When you sell a home it is common for a buyer to have the property inspected and then come back to the seller requesting some repairs. This causes the seller, who is now you, to arrange for and manage contractors who will make those repairs and potentially pay for those up-front. Why not avoid this difficult step all together?

One way to avoid managing those projects is to proclaim you are selling the home as-is. Direct your agent to share why the home is being sold as-is. This will dissuade buyers from wrongly assuming it is a fire sale or that there is something critically wrong with the home. Also, buyers can still have a home inspection despite the home being sold as-is. You may even want to consider having the inspected on your own. If you choose this, make the home inspection available for potential buyers to review. This is called a pre-inspection. It is a very effective tactic for as-is home sales.

If selling the home as-is is scaring off too many buyers or attracting low offers, try this instead. Keep with the traditional routine of the buyer having an inspection and requesting repairs. But once you receive the buyer’s response with the requested repairs, offer money instead. You can offer to cover their closing costs or lower the purchase price of the home. This is a great way to keep you from managing those projects and related costs up-front. You basically pay them off to keep things moving forward.

Conclusion

Work closely with your agent and you should see the home sell very similarly to a home sold under any other circumstance.