Online auctions for resale

[Gregory Childs]

We ended up with a few too many properties that completed rehab at the same time; so we thought we might try auctioning a couple using a company called RealtyBid as an alternative to selling on the MLS.

We usually sell for 10% below market value (in order to drive traffic) and by the time we pay $3k+ for buyers closing costs/incentives we are getting close to the 15% below market that RealtyBid estimate we should achieve. Plus the marketing process online is pretty short... which if it works would increase our turn ratio.

Anyway, we're going to put a few properties up in GA/AZ to test the theory and I will report back.

Any thoughts? Anyone used a similar strategy?

Thanks,
Greg