Maria Gudelis

As I mentioned before, many of your potential buyers may be from out of the area. You can beef up your chances of receiving bites on your property by adding information about the area and its surroundings, such as the commute time to downtown, to area school districts, to local shopping areas, and area attractions. You also might want to include information on the school districts as well as links to the districts for review, some of the activities in the area for children, and any other family- or pet-friendly community activities you know of in the area.

EBay has two selling formats for real estate. The first is the auction format, which is designed to sell items in a quick time period. You’ll use the auction format if you want or need to move your property in less than 30 days. Final auction results are binding. The second format is the classifieds. You’ll use the classified format if you are looking to sell your property in 30 to 90 days. A classified ad is non-binding for the buyer and is designed to be used as more of a bulletin board to collect lead information of people who are interested in your real estate. This enables you to collect the names of potential buyers, send them more information, or contact them to close the sale offline.

I’ve found that the classified section also is a great tool for lead generation for other properties I have now or that I might acquire in the future.

If you have more than one property to sell, list only one at a time and list the others on your storefront. Then, you can list the information about your other properties and a link to your storefront in your auction, and if people are interested, they’ll go there. You want to use eBay as your marketing site €” as a great lead-generator.

Purchase a one-year Home Warranty. I’ve found that the average price is around $349, but that varies with location, and the payoff is worth it. For one thing, I believe that having the warranty helps to sell the house, and for another, it helps me sleep easier at night in case something happens.

For an additional $50, I always add coverage to protect the seller if anything happens between the listing time and the closing date.