Shea and I made the offer on our new house on October 5 and took possession on November 22.
For a variety of reasons, we were in a fortunate position where we didn’t have to make the purchase conditional on the sale of our old house and, in fact, we were fully prepared to float two mortgages for a while if we had to including into the new year as the conventional wisdom is that you shouldn’t list houses for sale in December because people don’t tend to buy houses at that time of year anyhow so your house just ends up sitting on the market longer than if you’d held off until the new year for a new listing.
Our realtor said there were reasons to list it before Christmas and reasons to hold off until the new year but she pointed out that ultimately, if you list before Christmas and don’t get much interest, other realtors will know it’s likely due to the holidays being a slow time and not assume your house is sitting for a long time because there’s something wrong with it.
On the other hand, she pointed out that you never know when your buyer is looking and you don’t want to miss that window. Or leave your house empty for an extended period with all the increased risks of break-ins, water breaks, higher insurance costs, etc. Or, even if you’re in a position and willing to do so, why would you carry two mortgages (and all related expenses for two houses – utilities, insurance, etc.) not to mention that a house might simply be *harder* to sell once it’s completely empty since buyers assume you’re desperate.
Thinking how we’d bought our previous house in December, how I’d moved into an apartment for library school in December, how many people get transferred for work or start school on January 1, how an increasing number of people don’t even celebrate Christmas so they’re less likely to hit “pause” on a home search just because it’s December, etc. made us realise that it’s not like no one is moving in December. In fact, you might even have some big advantages selling around the holidays.
For all those reasons, we decided we could make all the timelines work and we were able to get our house listed before the end of November using professional photos taken while our house was still in-transition rather than completely empty so we didn’t look like, well, people who were desperate to sell and likely carrying two mortgages. 😉
I don’t want to jinx anything but I will mention that we had six showings within three days (!) and at least one potential buyer was *very* interested.
So it remains to be seen what might happen next. But with my fingers crossed, I’ll say that deciding to list our house in late November might turn out to be a great decision after all!
