Author Topic: Sell before finding our next home??  (Read 1111 times)

albireo13

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Sell before finding our next home??
« on: March 15, 2019, 05:38:57 AM »
Well, we are on a quest this year to find our forever house.  We like our existing house but, it's a bit cramped and there are features that make it
not an option for getting older in .... steep driveway, lots of stairs, etc.   As we enter our landing pattern for retirement we think it's best to move now rather than wait until we have to.

So, we have listed our house and have gotten multiple offers at listed price, with closing out to end of June.
We have until tomorrow to accept the offer and are going back and forth. 
We worry about selling our house without having a place to live identified yet.

Our last move, we felt rushed and had to move out before moving into our next home.  It meant renting for a short spell and a double move.

Our offers are great but, we fear we are getting ourselves into the same situation again and are not sure how long it will take to find our next house.

Question ...   what have other folks done?
1. Sell first, then rent and find the house?

2. Pull our house offer the market, hunt for our next house, and re-list when we find it?
  This is safer but, it gets us into a more complicated situation of timing the sale and the purchase.

Inputs and stories are welcome.

Thx,
Rob

Omy

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Re: Sell before finding our next home??
« Reply #1 on: March 15, 2019, 09:31:45 AM »
If you have multiple offers, you could ask for a "home of choice" contingency. The buyer waits for you to find your "home of choice" and you reimburse them for their inspection costs if you bail out of the contract because you can't find a new home.

Or sell, stick everything in a Pod, and live in corporate/extended stay housing until you find the next place.

Trying to do back-to-back settlements is tricky and stressful since there are so many moving parts.

Fishindude

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Re: Sell before finding our next home??
« Reply #2 on: March 15, 2019, 10:38:15 AM »
You kind of made up your mind to sell the place when you listed it, so I'd just go ahead and close the deal.  You can either get real busy trying to find your next place, or rent for a while and take your time.

GizmoTX

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Re: Sell before finding our next home??
« Reply #3 on: March 15, 2019, 11:07:00 AM »
As much as we hate the move process, I'd take whatever time is necessary to find a forever home & rent if I have to.
Since you've already listed, if you have a realtor, you have a contractual obligation to accept a reasonable offer. Selling now means you will have the money in hand & don't run the risk of owning 2 houses. Put the proceeds in a money market account.
Closing in June should allow you enough time to seriously de-clutter your possessions, assuming you can start right away or after a short option period (required in TX). You don't want to move anything you aren't going to keep. This process is time consuming, so don't delay -- we needed every day. As tempting as it is, don't house hunt until you have the de-cluttering done. 

We're retired, decided to downsize & move to Austin, decided to build on a lake property there that we've owned for 19 years, worked with an architect to design an aging-in-place house, moved into a rental so we could demolish the existing old lake house, sold our big Dallas house, put the Dallas furnishings we plan to keep into storage, are busy making many selections, and can't wait to finally move into our forever home this fall! It's been a busy year but so liberating.

albireo13

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Re: Sell before finding our next home??
« Reply #4 on: March 16, 2019, 11:37:33 AM »
Well, we signed the P&S on the offer today!
Time too start decluttering and moving forward.