Posted by Kim Adamof on Thu, Mar 19, 2009 @ 02:28 PM
People who sell their home may be able to exclude the gain from their income. Here are seven things every homeowner should know if they sold, or plan to sell their house.
- Amount of exclusion. When you have gain from the sale of your home, you may be able to exclude up to $250,000 of the gain from your income. For most taxpayers filing a joint return, the exclusion amount is $500,000.
- Ownership test. To claim the exclusion you must have owned the home for at least two years during the five year period ending on the date of the sale.
- Use test. You also must have lived in the house and used it as your main home for at least two years during the five year period ending on the date of the sale.
- When not to report. If you are able to exclude all of the gain from the sale of your home, you do not need to report the sale on your federal income tax return.
- Reporting taxable gain. If you have gain which cannot be excluded, it is taxable and must be reported on your tax return using Schedule D.
- Deducting a loss. You cannot deduct a loss from the sale of your home.
- Rules for multiple homes. If you have more than one home, you may only exclude gain from the sale of your main home and must pay tax on the gain resulting from the sale of any other home. Your main home is generally the one you live in most of the time.
For more information see IRS Publication 523, Selling Your Home, available at IRS.gov or by calling 800-TAX-FORM (800-829-3676).
Posted by Kim Adamof on Wed, Mar 04, 2009 @ 09:19 AM
Are you thinking of selling your own home and want to try this system?
Our Free eBook will go over the basics of the program. It reveals the overall program but it doesn't go into any details. You can use it to try to sell this way but I've written down EXACTLY what I do from beginning to end.
My Customized Sold in a Week Home Selling System comes with the marketing checklist, handouts for buyers, steps on creating an online flyer and website, plus a whole lot more!
It basically tells you what I do as a realtor. I probably shouldn't be letting people know my marketing secrets.
I don't give this System to anyone unless they are SERIOUS about selling.
If you are in North Carolina, you are eligible for our coaching. But if you are in another state, I am not licensed there so I will sell you the program and you are welcome to call with questions on marketing only. A good real estate attorney would be advised.
Email me and I'll send you the prices and sample pages from the Program.
Posted by Kim Adamof on Thu, Feb 12, 2009 @ 06:43 PM
I found this article by Realtor.org to be very interesting....
Home Sellers Seeking Professional Representation Rising
By Harika "Anna" Barlett, Senior Research Analyst
With housing inventory at its highest since the early 1980s, a greater number of home sellers understand the value of professional representation. This is understandable given that the housing market has been challenged in the past two years and inventory of homes for sale reached its highest point since the early 1980s.
The 2008 NAR Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers reveals that among recent home sellers surveyed in August 2008, the pure For-Sale-By-Owner (FSBO) sales - those cases where the seller did not know the buyer - remain historically low at 7 percent. It had been closer to 10 percent during the housing boom years.
Among the shrinking pool of FSBO sellers, the outcome results of such sales are highly questionable. FSBO sellers, who sold their home to someone they did not previously know, sold their homes within a median of six weeks. By contrast agent-assisted sales took a median of nine weeks. In addition, the median selling price as a percentage of the asking price was 97% for those FSBO sellers, compared to 96% among agent-assisted sales.
At first glance, FSBO transactions appear to be doing quite well. However, the median selling price of an open market FSBO home was $150,100, while the median price for agent-assisted sales was $211,000.
FSBOs have typically been more popular among lower income households trying to sell lower priced homes. So one may argue that price difference results between FSBO and agent-assisted sales is due to characteristics of lower-valued and smaller-sized FSBO homes. Indeed, the average home size in FSBO sales is smaller. The median home size in open market FSBO sales is 1,515 square feet, compared to the median of 1,850 square feet in agent-assisted sales.
However, when we compare median prices per square foot of home, the data show that it was $92 in FSBO sales, and $116 in agent-assisted sales, with a difference of $24 per square foot of home sold. Considering the median size of 1,515 square feet in FSBO sales, this translates into a price difference of $36,360 on a size-adjusted base. So the claims that FSBO sales are getting completed faster and the owners get a price closer to their asking price are misleading. The FSBO homes, given the nature of the market, are being listed at deeply discounted prices. Because lower prices get buyers' attention, any subsequent price concession afterwards tend to therefore be small. FSBO owners have in essence mispriced their homes too low.
The chart below shows the price comparisons between FSBOs and agent-assisted sales. The FSBO segment is broken out between those sellers who already knew the buyer to delineate arms-length transactions like those that with occur within a family or friends.
Regarding the length of time a home was on the market prior to sale, the time will obviously be much shorter for mispriced, discounted homes. That result is revealed in the chart below. The length of time a home was on the market prior to sale also changes by location, in addition to sale method. In open-market FSBO sales, the median time on the market was six weeks, compared to the median of nine weeks for agent-assisted sales. This difference gets bigger in the sale of those homes located in a small town - five versus ten weeks. However, it is smaller for those sales that take place in a suburban area (six versus eight weeks); and it is reversed in those sales that take place in an urban area. In urban areas, open market FSBO sales take a longer time, a median of ten weeks, compared to the median of eight weeks for agent-assisted sales.
Consumers are smart. In more difficult times for housing and the economy, a greater number of people are seeking professional real estate advice. Consumers in the end are also greatly benefiting as a result of having sought out professional representation.