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| Hints for Selling Your Own Home |
| Alan Kopit, lawyers.com Legal Editor |
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Selling a home on your own can be an exciting challenge, and a great way to save thousands of dollars. After sprucing up the interior and doing the appropriate pricing research, the most important step a seller needs to take may be hiring a real estate attorney. A real estate attorney can be essential to the successful sale of your home, and will help ensure that your best interests are taken care of, and that you do not leave yourself open to potential legal pitfalls.
Alan Kopit, legal editor of LexisNexis Martindale-Hubbell's lawyers.com, says, "People might be intimidated by the idea of selling a home on their own, but with careful planning and the help of an experienced real estate attorney, pretty much anyone can handle the challenge on their own." Lawyers.com, a free online attorney database, is the most comprehensive and trustworthy online resource for finding a lawyer.
These are the most important issues to discuss with your real estate attorney:
Property Disclosures - Disclosure laws vary from state to state and can include anything from the year your home was built to whether the home is on an earthquake fault line.
Contracts - You will want an attorney to review any contracts you might sign or have signed to ensure that your interests are protected.
Escrow/Buyer's Deposits - Once a buyer has made an offer and put down a deposit, it is best for both parties if that deposit goes into an attorney's escrow account - for the peace of mind afforded to everyone involved.
Fair Housing Laws - A real estate attorney will help you to ensure that you are not inadvertently violating any elements of your state's fair housing laws.
Closing - Once all is said and done, your real estate attorney will be able to review all final contracts, payments and agreements between buyer and seller to ensure that the closing will go smoothly.
Alan Kopit is the legal editor of lawyers.com and partner at the Cleveland-based law firm Hahn Loeser & Parks LLP. He has contributed columns to lawyers.com, focusing on consumer and small business legal issues and his media appearances include MSNBC, CNBC, CNNfn, Bloomberg Television, WEWS-TV Cleveland (ABC), WKYC-TV Cleveland (NBC), WKBC-TV Houston (NBC), Bloomberg Radio, and legal contributor to NBC-TV's Today show. For more information about Alan Kopit, please see his biography.
LexisNexis Martindale-Hubbell's lawyers.com is the leading lawyer directory on the Web, providing access to more than 440,000 attorneys and law firms nationwide. More than one million searches per month are conducted at lawyers.com by consumers and business people in search of the right lawyer for their needs.
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