If you have owned your South Florida home for a few years, you are likely sitting on real equity, and that equity can become the down payment on your next home. The challenge is timing. Selling one home and buying another at the same time takes a plan, because the order you do things in affects your stress level, your negotiating power, and your finances.
Start With Your Real Numbers
Before you look at a single home, find out what you would actually walk away with from a sale. That means a realistic sale price based on current comps, minus your mortgage payoff, closing costs, and any repairs or concessions. Our net proceeds calculator gives you a starting point, and our affordability calculator shows how that equity translates into your next purchase price.
Option One: Sell First
Selling first gives you certainty about your budget and makes you a stronger buyer, because your offer will not depend on another sale. The tradeoff is where you live in between. Common solutions include negotiating a short rent back from your buyer after closing, or a short term rental while you shop.
Option Two: Buy First
Buying first lets you move once and take your time choosing the right home. It usually requires carrying two housing payments for a period, or using financing such as a home equity line of credit or a bridge loan to access your equity before your current home sells. This works best when your finances can comfortably handle the overlap. Talk to a lender early to see what you qualify for.
Option Three: Close on Both Together
Many move up sellers aim to close the sale and the purchase on the same day or within a few days of each other. You can also make your purchase contingent on the sale of your current home, though sellers may view that offer as weaker in a competitive situation. Tight coordination between both contracts, both lenders, and both title companies is what makes this work.
Take Your Tax Savings With You
Florida’s Save Our Homes benefit limits how much your homestead’s assessed value can rise each year, and over time that can create a large gap between your market value and your taxable value. Portability lets you move up to $500,000 of that accumulated benefit to a new Florida homestead, as long as you establish the new homestead within three years of leaving the old one. You must apply for it, so do not skip that step. Your county property appraiser can estimate your portable amount.
One Team, Both Sides
The simplest move up sales happen when the same team is managing both transactions. Pricing the sale, timing the listing, and negotiating the purchase all affect each other, and having one plan keeps the pieces from working against you.
Thinking about moving up? Schedule a seller consultation and we will map out the timing of both moves before you commit to either one.