Customer Reviews

The For Sale by Owner Handbook

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Knowledgeably and informatively written by an award winning writer and professional realtor, this book gives the homeowner the insider tips, insights and everything one needs to know to make their home sale much more profitable. Whether you're selling on your own or through a realtor, it really guides you in making a great deal more money on the sale of your home.
It gives an insider's scoop that will keep you ahead of the selling process from start to closing. Well laid out and personably written this book kept me enthused throughout the entire book! It has massive amounts of great information, detailed descriptions, tips and examples to walk you through each step.
This book makes how to sell real estate a breeze! Even includes a cash profit worksheet, samples and how & when to sell.
I also enjoyed all the extras in the book like "how to make your home irresistible to buyers", "great ideas", "creating the right ambiance" to "curb appeal", "how to write your ad", "techniques for pricing your home" and "evaluating the offers". It made me feel very comfortable in how to sell real estate, I'm glad you wrote it!
Kudos! on this great new book! If you own a home you need to own this book!

Tony Henriques

I went to the library and got several books on FSBO and this one was the best. Several books I had from the library were not true FBSO books for they only had one chapter talking about it. This handbook was not like that. With it recieved my full asking price and was able to understand confusing jardon and rules in selling the house. Most importantly, I felt secure at every step of the selling process that i was not getting ripped off and everything was fair.

This book appears to have been thrown together quickly in order to satisfy a market niche. First and foremost, it is lacking in detail. There's no way you can take what you "learn" in this book and then immediately sell your home FSBO. You need a lot more information on closing, home inspection, and numerous other issues on which this book barely touches. Furthermore, the formatting of the book, which highlights the opinions of "experts," is often contradictory without any insight into or explanation of the contrary opinions. Rather, mutually exclusive opinions (and facts!) are presented side-by-side. Finally, there are tons of typos and grammatical errors in this book -- which is predominantly fluff, any way. The type face is large and the book is thin. Although there isn't a lot of material to be found on selling FSBO (for obvious reasons), would-be FSBO sellers would be smart to continue their searches rather than stopping here.

I bought this book and the FSBO Kit book by Irwin, and this one is far superior! This book is concise and packs more useful information, especially once you've found a buyer. The other has much less on negotiating, writing contracts, the steps leading to closing, who pays for what, estimates for repairs post-inspection, and tips for packing. I'd describe the Irwin book as more of a pep-talk, but it did give me the confidence to do it myself.

I found the contents very practical and a good step by step guide through the process of "For Sale by Owner" and if followed should lead to money saving. The website references were helpful.
A must read for property owners preparing to sell

Piper does an amazing job of describing, in detail, every single thing you need to know about selling your house on your own. I wish I had had this book when I was selling my house. I KNOW I would have made a lot more money. Very in depth and informative. Every home owner that is planning on selling their home should own this book.

I was introduced to the book from the FSBO site, SearchHomesOnTV.com Wow.. I was really surprised to learn how easy it is to manage a for sale by owner transaction. Piper does a great job of outlining the process and goes into detail yet not too technical. She demonstrates with sample forms and outlines the process. If you are considering selling your home on your own.. its worth the cover price..

With all due respect to the results the other reviewers may have gotten, I and my wife can say with certainty that this book, or the other FSBO book we bought, would not have gotten us through the kind of sale we faced in the turbulent California market at the end of 2007. The book had some very practical tips on prepping the house prior to sale, but would have provided little guidance in dealing with the kind of realtor & buyers that we consistently had to deal with, and who ultimately made the only decent offer on our place, but who ultimately strung us out (missing the escrow date in the disintegrating lending market), and tried to worm all kinds of preposterous conditions and discounts from us. We fell back on our very experienced realtor who knew exactly how to deal with such people and situations. I wouldn't not recommend this, or any other FSBO book (though the boiler-plate contracts in the other book were ultimately worthless), but BE PREPARED to have a GOOD realtor on your side should things go wrong. An green seller would not have the perspective to deal with sharky buyers and realtor-lender teams. Be warned.

I read about half a dozen books prior to listing my house for sale. This was one of the top two. It would be difficult for any single book to cover everything, and the different view points of different authors is useful to get. If you're looking to buy a book about the FSBO process you won't go wrong with this one, it is full of helpful information.

The best one - it was very helpful in getting me through the fine details. Well worth the money.