There is a wide variety of For Sale By Owner Websites in NYC that you can find through a simple internet search. However, most of them are no better than expensive scams which often do more harm than good to a potential FSBO seller.
Fizber
This For Sale By Owner website is based in California and claims to cover all areas of the United States. It also claims to be “free” to list. Unfortunately, the “free” listing option is nothing more than a listing on their website. No one actually searches on their website except the occasional agent looking for For Sale By Owner sellers to solicit. They do offer “flat fee” MLS packages for around $350 as of this writing; however, it is very unspecific as to which MLS your property will be listed on. This is dangerous for NYC home sellers as NYC is covered by REBNY which is not associated with any MLS. REBNY operates a private inter-brokerage listings database called RLS (REBNY Listing Service).
Recommendation: Avoid. You will be paying for a irrelevant MLS listing (most likely Long Island MLS or NY State MLS) which no brokers in New York City use.
Owners
This For Sale By Owner website also claims to cover all or most areas of the United States. The “free” listing option simply puts your home on their website which no buyers unfortunately use to search. The only people who will troll this website for FSBO listings will be sophisticated vulture buyers looking for off market properties or agents looking for new listings to poach.
Their flat fee MLS listing packages are approximately $400 or $500. Unfortunately, they do not specify which MLS your home will be listed in. For New York City home owners this is a serious issue as we do not have a mainstream, local MLS.
Recommendation: Avoid. You will be paying for an irrelevant MLS listing which does not cover New York City. You need to list on the RLS (REBNY Listing Service) if your home is located in NYC.
ForSaleByOwner and Xome
This For Sale By Owner website is one of the original “national” FSBO sites claiming to have the ability to list sellers on their local MLS no matter which state they reside in. They also offer a “free” listing on their site which unfortunately is a trap for sellers as no one actually searches on their website vs popular real estate search websites like Zillow or StreetEasy. Moreover, this “free” listing will start costing the home seller approximately $20 per month after 30 days. Talk about paying to be off market!
Beware of their new “free” Super Seller listing option. If you read the fine print, you will notice that they will be adding 5% to the buyer’s purchase price in commission. This will technically be a buyer’s closing cost, but how attractive do you think this will be given that buyers traditionally do not have to pay commission? Why would they choose to buy something that will cost them 5% in commission when they can pay 0% commission on any other listing? The 5% will be split 2% to the seller’s broker, 2% to the buyer’s broker and 1% to Xome which is an auction website partnering with ForSaleByOwner. $150 of the 1% to Xome will be paid to ForSaleByOwner as a referral fee.
They also offer a Premium Agent listing option which pays 2% to the listing broker instead of the traditional 3%. This does not include the 2-3% commission traditionally offered to a buyer’s broker. So if you offered 3% to buyers’ agents your total cost would be 5% with this option. The value of any of these services is not clear versus a normal listing with a traditional, brand name brokerage which costs 6% total.
Recommendation: Avoid. In our experience, making the buyer pay the broker commission which is traditionally a seller closing cost is not a good idea. If you want to sell fast through an auction, why not just use a traditional broker instead for approximately the same cost?
Hauseit
Hauseit is a For Sale By Owner website dedicated to New York City home sellers and is one of the few companies we’ve found that do offer access to the RLS (REBNY Listing Service). They offer a self service listing option which costs $399 for 3 months as of this writing, or a full service listing option that pays 1% to the listing broker. It is unclear what the total cost of the full service option is as we presume that the seller would also want to offer a common 2 to 3% commission to buyers agents.
One thing we found interesting about this company is that Hauseit does not seem to list the homes directly. Instead, broker partners in their network will list the homes and mix the listings in with their full commission listings.
The interesting thing we will admit to this approach is that it becomes considerably harder for traditional brokers to boycott discount listings if they can’t tell it’s a discount listing. The broker partners from the reviews we’ve read are all traditional brokerages in the city, some of whom appear to be quite established.
Recommendation: Investigate. This approach is different from what we’ve traditional seen in the For Sale By Owner and discount brokerage industry. While their reviews are good, they are a newer company and as with anything new, it should first be investigated.
RealDirect
This is actually a discount real estate brokerage versus a For Sale By Owner website in NYC. This discount broker does happen to offer a flat fee listing service that costs $395 per month or 1% of the purchase price payable at closing.
They also offer a “full service” listing option which pays 2% to the seller’s broker at closing plus up to 3% to a buyer’s broker. The total cost for this service is 5% versus a traditional 6% listing.
The problem with discount brokerage is that it is not a new idea. This company is similar to RedFin which does the same thing on a national scale (but not in NYC). The issue with discount brokerage is that traditional brokers harbor resentment towards their discount peers who they view as “cheating” to get deals. As a result, discount brokers throughout the decades have always had issues with their traditional peers either through boycotting of their listings or a lack of cooperation. Unfortunately in real estate, the cooperation of two listings is typically necessary to successfully complete a deal.
Recommendation: Avoid. This approach has been tried unsuccessfully by much better capitalized companies such as RedFin for decades. Unfortunately, RedFin still only has a under 0.5% market share in its home county. The resentment and non-cooperation of traditional brokers has always proven too much for discount brokers to handle.
Enjoy our article? Read more about how to sell your home and general real estate tips in our award winning blog!
Fizber
This For Sale By Owner website is based in California and claims to cover all areas of the United States. It also claims to be “free” to list. Unfortunately, the “free” listing option is nothing more than a listing on their website. No one actually searches on their website except the occasional agent looking for For Sale By Owner sellers to solicit. They do offer “flat fee” MLS packages for around $350 as of this writing; however, it is very unspecific as to which MLS your property will be listed on. This is dangerous for NYC home sellers as NYC is covered by REBNY which is not associated with any MLS. REBNY operates a private inter-brokerage listings database called RLS (REBNY Listing Service).
Recommendation: Avoid. You will be paying for a irrelevant MLS listing (most likely Long Island MLS or NY State MLS) which no brokers in New York City use.
Owners
This For Sale By Owner website also claims to cover all or most areas of the United States. The “free” listing option simply puts your home on their website which no buyers unfortunately use to search. The only people who will troll this website for FSBO listings will be sophisticated vulture buyers looking for off market properties or agents looking for new listings to poach.
Their flat fee MLS listing packages are approximately $400 or $500. Unfortunately, they do not specify which MLS your home will be listed in. For New York City home owners this is a serious issue as we do not have a mainstream, local MLS.
Recommendation: Avoid. You will be paying for an irrelevant MLS listing which does not cover New York City. You need to list on the RLS (REBNY Listing Service) if your home is located in NYC.
ForSaleByOwner and Xome
This For Sale By Owner website is one of the original “national” FSBO sites claiming to have the ability to list sellers on their local MLS no matter which state they reside in. They also offer a “free” listing on their site which unfortunately is a trap for sellers as no one actually searches on their website vs popular real estate search websites like Zillow or StreetEasy. Moreover, this “free” listing will start costing the home seller approximately $20 per month after 30 days. Talk about paying to be off market!
Beware of their new “free” Super Seller listing option. If you read the fine print, you will notice that they will be adding 5% to the buyer’s purchase price in commission. This will technically be a buyer’s closing cost, but how attractive do you think this will be given that buyers traditionally do not have to pay commission? Why would they choose to buy something that will cost them 5% in commission when they can pay 0% commission on any other listing? The 5% will be split 2% to the seller’s broker, 2% to the buyer’s broker and 1% to Xome which is an auction website partnering with ForSaleByOwner. $150 of the 1% to Xome will be paid to ForSaleByOwner as a referral fee.
They also offer a Premium Agent listing option which pays 2% to the listing broker instead of the traditional 3%. This does not include the 2-3% commission traditionally offered to a buyer’s broker. So if you offered 3% to buyers’ agents your total cost would be 5% with this option. The value of any of these services is not clear versus a normal listing with a traditional, brand name brokerage which costs 6% total.
Recommendation: Avoid. In our experience, making the buyer pay the broker commission which is traditionally a seller closing cost is not a good idea. If you want to sell fast through an auction, why not just use a traditional broker instead for approximately the same cost?
Hauseit
Hauseit is a For Sale By Owner website dedicated to New York City home sellers and is one of the few companies we’ve found that do offer access to the RLS (REBNY Listing Service). They offer a self service listing option which costs $399 for 3 months as of this writing, or a full service listing option that pays 1% to the listing broker. It is unclear what the total cost of the full service option is as we presume that the seller would also want to offer a common 2 to 3% commission to buyers agents.
One thing we found interesting about this company is that Hauseit does not seem to list the homes directly. Instead, broker partners in their network will list the homes and mix the listings in with their full commission listings.
The interesting thing we will admit to this approach is that it becomes considerably harder for traditional brokers to boycott discount listings if they can’t tell it’s a discount listing. The broker partners from the reviews we’ve read are all traditional brokerages in the city, some of whom appear to be quite established.
Recommendation: Investigate. This approach is different from what we’ve traditional seen in the For Sale By Owner and discount brokerage industry. While their reviews are good, they are a newer company and as with anything new, it should first be investigated.
RealDirect
This is actually a discount real estate brokerage versus a For Sale By Owner website in NYC. This discount broker does happen to offer a flat fee listing service that costs $395 per month or 1% of the purchase price payable at closing.
They also offer a “full service” listing option which pays 2% to the seller’s broker at closing plus up to 3% to a buyer’s broker. The total cost for this service is 5% versus a traditional 6% listing.
The problem with discount brokerage is that it is not a new idea. This company is similar to RedFin which does the same thing on a national scale (but not in NYC). The issue with discount brokerage is that traditional brokers harbor resentment towards their discount peers who they view as “cheating” to get deals. As a result, discount brokers throughout the decades have always had issues with their traditional peers either through boycotting of their listings or a lack of cooperation. Unfortunately in real estate, the cooperation of two listings is typically necessary to successfully complete a deal.
Recommendation: Avoid. This approach has been tried unsuccessfully by much better capitalized companies such as RedFin for decades. Unfortunately, RedFin still only has a under 0.5% market share in its home county. The resentment and non-cooperation of traditional brokers has always proven too much for discount brokers to handle.
Enjoy our article? Read more about how to sell your home and general real estate tips in our award winning blog!