Can You Buy A Home Without A Realtor?

Yes. You can buy a home without a realtor. Especially in the age of internet.

Before the digital age, real estate agents played an even more critical role in the home-buying process than they do today. Prospective buyers would visit real estate offices to browse through thick binders or physical listings of homes. These listings, often updated weekly or monthly, were the primary source of information. Agents served as gatekeepers to the available properties, providing insights and arranging viewings.

Local newspapers were another vital resource for home buyers. The classified section on weekends would be filled with advertisements for homes on sale. Buyers would spend hours combing through these ads, circling potential properties, and then making phone calls to arrange visits. It was a slow, meticulous process that required patience and persistence.

But then came the internet. With information about home listings readily available, sites like Zillow, Redfin practically replicated the Multiple Listing Service and made its data available to buyers, the benefits of having a realtor started to become blurry.

Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely believe real estate agents still add a lot of value, especially to first time home buyers, relocation buyers, etc.

But there’s a reason you are here. You want to know if you can buy a house without a realtor. The answer is yes, you absolutely can.

If you want to know the benefits of buying a house without a real estate agent, you can read about it here. I highly recommend reading through it to understand why buying without a realtor could worth the effort (imagine saving thousands when buying a home).

Let’s dive a bit into how you can buy a home without a realtor. I am going to breakdown the entire home purchase process and offer general guidance on how you can buy a home without a realtor. After all, that’s why I created this site, diyhomebuyer.com, to help readers like you learn the home buying process.

What is the process of buying a home?

Well here’s a quick overview of the entire process of buying a home. To make it easy, I also created a flowchart that hopefully make things easy to understand.

Pre-Contract Phase

1. Find Home: Begin your search for the ideal home by exploring various neighborhoods, listing sites, and attending open houses. Your real estate agent will be instrumental in helping you identify homes that meet your criteria.
2. Pre-Approval for Mortgage: Before making any offers, get pre-approved for a mortgage. This step involves submitting financial documents to a lender who will assess your creditworthiness and determine how much you can borrow.
3. Negotiate: Once you find a home you like, your agent will help you negotiate the terms of the purchase with the seller. This includes the price, closing date, and any contingencies.
4. Submit Offer: After negotiations, submit a formal offer to the seller. This offer includes your proposed purchase price and any conditions or contingencies. You can use our Offer Submission Tool to help you create a purchase offer on the home.

Under Contract Phase

5. Coordinate Inspection: After your offer is accepted, schedule a home inspection to identify any potential issues with the property. This step is crucial for uncovering any hidden problems that might need addressing before closing.
6. Coordinate Repairs/Negotiation (if applicable): If the inspection reveals issues, you may need to negotiate with the seller for repairs or a price reduction. Your agent will help facilitate these discussions.
7. Coordinate Appraisal: The lender will require an appraisal to determine the home’s market value. This step ensures the loan amount does not exceed the property’s worth.
8. Title Search and Title Insurance: A title search is conducted to ensure the property is free of liens or claims. Title insurance protects you and the lender against any future disputes over property ownership.
9. Loan Underwriting/Securing the Loan: The lender’s underwriting department will review all the documentation to finalize the loan approval. This includes verifying your income, credit, and the property details.
10. Final Walkthrough: Conduct a final walkthrough of the property to ensure it is in the agreed-upon condition. This typically happens a day or two before closing.
11. Coordinate Closing: Your agent will coordinate with all parties involved to schedule the closing. This includes the seller, lender, title company, and any attorneys.

Closing Phase

12. Close on the Home: On the closing day, you’ll sign all necessary documents, finalize the mortgage, and pay closing costs. Once everything is completed, you’ll receive the keys to your new home.

Who handles which part?

Now this next part shows who usually takes care of which part of the process.

As you can see, there are a lot of moving parts in which the an real estate agent is involved. But this doesn’t mean these tasks are particularly difficult for DIY Home Buyers such as yourself.

From my perspective, real estate agents now take more of a project manager type of role in the home purchase process, where the value add is to make sure no one in this process drop the ball and ensure a successful closing.

Anyone who has worked on any sorts of big projects, should be able to understand the value of a Project Manager at keeping the project moving forward, especially for something that’s as time sensitive as buying a home.

So when you decide to buy a home without a realtor, be sure you can take over the tasks of a real estate agent that’s on the flowchart above.

And by using tools that we provide here at diyhomebuyer.com such as our Offer Submission tool, you can write a standard home purchase offer via intuitive UI that just makes sense.

Final Thoughts

Buying a home without a realtor can be challenging, but it can also be very rewarding. If you want to save thousands of dollars in buyers agent commission or home price deduction, be sure to read how to buy a home without a realtor guide and utilize all of the resources here at diyhomebuyer.com.

If you want to compare the pros and cons of buying a home without a real estate agent, read our comparison guide on Full Service vs. Flat Fee vs. DIY Home Buyer.