We Sold Our House — FSBO Timeline and Experience

Holy cow — we actually sold our house.

(Pause while Sherry processes that sentence.)

Now that the inspection and appraisal are complete and the closing date is on the calendar, we finally feel comfortable sharing the news publicly. Nothing is official until we sign the final paperwork in early June, but so far everything is moving along smoothly.

First, some background: Sherry was determined to sell our house FSBO (For Sale By Owner) again. Her math showed we could save nearly ten thousand dollars by not paying a seller’s agent commission. Even selling to a buyer represented by an agent would mean paying only the buyer’s side (around 3%) instead of 6%, which made DIY selling appealing. I remembered the stress of our previous sale and was curious about working with an agent this time, so we compromised: try FSBO for one week. If that didn’t generate interest, we’d pay a few hundred dollars to list on the MLS ourselves, and if that still didn’t produce offers after a few weeks, we’d consider hiring a Realtor.

Here’s how things actually unfolded.

Timeline: When the House Went on the Market

Friday, April 26: Anne, the Realtor who helped us buy our new place, called to ask if our current house was on the market. She happened to have buyers looking for a ranch and thought ours would be a great fit. We told her we planned to list in four days and to let us know if her buyers wanted a showing.

Saturday & Sunday, April 27–28: We spent the weekend finishing last-minute projects and tidying up, just in case someone wanted to see the house quickly. (We’ll share a separate post with staging details soon.)

Monday, April 29

• 2:00 pm — Anne called: her buyers wanted to see the house the next day at 2:00pm. Surprise showing!
• 2:30 pm — Reality check: we hadn’t made a flyer or settled on a price. Time to act fast.
• 3:00 pm — The home got a frantic cleaning session. Toys were corralled, surfaces wiped, and storage ottomans earned their keep.
• 9:30 pm — After checking comparable listings, we picked a list price and put a flyer together.
• 12:30 am — Technical difficulties wiped out our work; we were too tired to redo it that night.

Tuesday, April 30

• 7:00 am — Rebuilt the flyer and proofread our announcement post.
• 9:00 am — Flyer printed. More cleaning to polish up the place.
• 10:00 am — Post went live and comments started pouring in. We fixed a grimy tub caulk while answering readers.
• 1:30 pm — House presentable but we were sweaty messes. Anne would be showing the buyers, thankfully.
• 1:45 pm — Anne arrived early to review recent improvements.
• 1:55 pm — The buyers arrived early, so we left to give them privacy.
• 2:00 pm — With Burger and Clara in tow, we killed time at a nearby dog-friendly mall and avoided hovering while the buyers toured our home.
• 3:30 pm — We returned to see Anne and the buyers just leaving. Anne called: they liked the house and wanted to sleep on it and crunch numbers.
• Evening — We emailed a few more flyers, scheduled another showing, and collapsed after a long day.

Wednesday, May 1

• Early morning — Sherry woke with ideas about new-house projects and drafted another post. I headed to the gym and then helped get Clara ready for her day with Grammy.
• 10:00 am — House prepped for the second showing while Clara visited Grammy.
• 11:00 am — Potential buyers arrived with their agent. We took a walk while they toured.
• 11:30 am — Someone who’d received our flyer wanted an afternoon showing. Things were picking up momentum.
• Noon — The second showing finished; the agent said they liked the house but needed to check details with their lender.
• 2:30 pm — A third set of buyers without an agent toured the property; I gave them the walkthrough while the family walked the dog.
• 3:30 pm — Anne called: the first buyers were sending an offer that evening. It was strong but $5,000 below our asking price.
• 7:00 pm — Another offer arrived. It wasn’t as strong, but it clarified our decision. We countered and asked if the first buyers would meet us in the middle.
• 7:15 pm — The buyers agreed. Anne brought the paperwork within the hour.
• 8:30 pm — We signed a stack of documents: our house was officially under contract — less than 36 hours after the first showing.

What’s Next

We still have a handful of tasks before closing: a few inspection items to address, a final termite inspection, and of course packing and moving into the new house. It’s shaping up to be a busy month.

We’re grateful and relieved that this FSBO experience went smoothly and quickly. Like last time, we’ll pay a 3% commission to the buyer’s agent, but handling the seller side ourselves saved us nearly $10,000. The market in our area seems to be rebounding — homes that are priced right and staged well are getting contracts within days to a week of listing — so if you’re thinking about selling, this might be encouraging news.

Funny enough, our buyer wasn’t a reader and didn’t find the house through our site. It was simply serendipity that we kept Anne in the loop and she happened to have buyers searching for a one-level, updated ranch like ours. So while we assumed a reader could be the buyer, it turned out our Realtor connection made all the difference — a reminder that there are many effective paths to a successful sale.

Compared to our first sale in 2010 — which required 14 showings over three weeks and several listing strategies — this process was remarkably fast. We’re counting our lucky stars and planning to move into the new house in about three weeks. Time to start packing!