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If you’re searching for a guide on how to sell a tiny house in 2023, then this is the article for you.
There has been a significant shift in the real estate industry as people are beginning to shift their attention from the bigger is the better mentality that comes with living in traditional homes to the less is more trend associated with tiny home living.
Without mincing words, the tiny home movement is becoming a big deal in the real estate space, especially as more homeowners seek to balance the insane cost that comes with living in traditional homes.
If you’re just learning about tiny homes, it will interest you to know that tiny homes are structures measuring between 400 square feet.
And guess what, a growing number of homeowners are beginning to love the idea of living in a limited space, especially one with a small environmental footprint.
But while there are lots of incredible perks that come with living in a tiny house, one of the most significant drawdowns that come with tiny homes is that they are pretty hard to sell.
But even though tiny home structures are hard to sell, you can still flip your home so long you’re aware of some of the unique challenges that come with tiny homes.
With a good strategy, it is only a matter of time before your home is off the market.
But before we give you a tour of some of the great tips for selling a tiny home, here is why selling your tiny home is a great idea.
Why selling a tiny house is a good idea
If you’re looking to get into real estate but don’t have that big bucks to put down on a home, then going for a tiny home wouldn’t be such a bad idea.
With tiny homes, you can invest a decent amount of money to buy a home and end up making a massive profit when you decide to flip.
You can also choose to buy a used tiny home for cheap, fix it up and make some great returns on your investment.
Like the traditional real estate industry, there is a lot of money to make from investing in tiny homes.
By simply buying a home today and keeping it in great shape for a few years, you can make almost double the price you initially invested.
Think we are bluffing?
Give it a try, and you’ll be glad you did.
That said, here are a few tips you can leverage to sell your tiny home:
- Know where to sell
- Take great pictures of your home
- Put together a detailed video tour
- Ensure your tiny home is priced correctly
- Stage your home
- Make the necessary repairs
- Network
Know where to sell
When it comes to the tiny home real estate industry, there isn’t a very big tiny house marketplace where you can easily flip your home.
Also, it’s almost impossible to get an entry on multiple listing services when it comes to tiny home listings.
This means that your tiny home on wheels for sale may not show up on the leading real estate platforms or apps.
To this end, you may have to connect directly with buyers in this growing industry.
Thankfully, there are several great sites, including Tiny House Listings, where you can easily list your home for sale.
When listing your tiny home for sale, it would be great to develop some creative name for your home.
Also, it would help if you include an indefinitely long description for your home, a sale price, photos, location, and video links where buyers can check out your home.
Take great pictures of your home
Taking great pictures of your home is super important if you want to flip your home quickly and for the best price too.
To capture fantastic photos, we always recommend using a wide-angle lens.
Using a wide-angle lens gives you a lot of options.
Besides being great for capturing great spots in your home without shaky hands, you’ll also get great pictures you’ll share across different social media channels.
While iPhones are great for capturing decent pictures, most iPhones don’t come with built-in wide-angle lens options.
To this end, you’ll need to invest in a good DSLR camera, especially one with a removable lens.
As a rule of thumb, the smaller your space, the wider you want your lens field of view to be.
You’ll be pleasantly surprised at how roomy your home will be using a 14mm lens.
When set up in the doorway, a 14mm lens will give you a nice picture of the entire room.
Also, we encourage investing in some lighting options.
Put together a video tour
One of the great things about selling your tiny home is that because of the small space that comes with this type of structure; you can easily give buyers a full tour of your home in a brief video.
To get things rolling, we always encourage tiny home sellers to include a walkthrough that showcases all of the great charms of their homes.
Once you have that, share it massively across social media.
Also, it would be great to include all of the hidden storage areas that may appeal to buyers who aren’t all that convinced about living in a tiny home.
While putting together a video tour for tiny homes on wheels for sale, you must take it slow and point out all of the home’s excellent features.
This should typically include items like the type of lighting, surface finishes, proximity to the bathroom, number of electrical outlets, and other features worth highlighting.
For newbies selling their tiny homes for the first time, you can simply talk while you walk through your home.
And if you want to take things up a notch, you can simply mount your camera on a tripod, film an opening, a closing scene, and add the narrated portions.
Also, make sure you include the exterior of your home, as it is just as important as the interior section.
While it’s crucial to feature every part of your home in the video tour, we always recommend keeping everything to 8 minutes.
You can also switch things up by including some B roll footage with some lovely voice-over narration.
For the exterior footage, you can include some good drone footage that captures your home from overhead.
Price your tiny home correctly
If you’re serious about flipping your tiny home, you need to be honest and reasonable with pricing.
If you didn’t invest up to $120,000 in your home, then we see no reason you should be asking a buyer to pay $120,000.
Even though there isn’t a legitimate real estate market for tiny homes, there are also no appreciation and depreciation cases.
Keep in mind that a value is only as high as buyers are willing to pay for it.
Suppose you have a 200 sq.
ft.
home that features a salvaged countertop, a missing water heater, no lighting in the loft, as well as some siding areas that are significantly damaged by water; you shouldn’t be expecting top dollar.
Network
When selling your tiny home, you have to take advantage of all the options you have.
While sites like Tiny House Listings are great for listing and selling your home, these aren’t the only options you should be exploring.
To take your tiny home marketing up a notch, we always encourage sellers to create a solid listing on Facebook.
To give your listing some exposure, you can share your tiny home listing to Facebook groups and via private messages.
You can also request your network to share and react to it.
This way, you’re a step ahead of the FB algorithm.
Instagram is another great place to sell your tiny home.
By using the Instagram slideshow option along with top hashtags like #realestate #tinyhomeforsalecraiglist #forsale, #tinyhouseonwheels, and more, you should get your tiny home the exposure it needs.
Other great options include sending tweets to your respective network that ultimately links back to your listing.
The more you leverage all the possibilities, the more interest your listing gets.
Stage Your Home
Before you list your tiny home for sale, you must have it staged.
Also, once you have decided to sell, your home must be thoroughly cleaned.
Again, you must declutter your small space as you don’t want anything looking out of place.
To get this spot on, it’s important you go the extra mile to rearrange the decor.
This way, you can easily demonstrate just how flexible tiny home real estate is.
Make necessary repairs
If you’re looking to get a good deal on your tiny house, you want to make all necessary repairs.
This will give buyers a good impression and spike their interest in your property.
Imagine how buyers would feel when they come for a home inspection and learn that the door creaks and the paint is chipping.
Or just a second to imagine the disgust on buyers’ faces when they learn that the toilet just won’t stop running.
Before you list your home for sale, make sure you do a thorough inspection and fix all the lingering issues right away.
The buyers’ responsibility
As a buyer looking to buy your dream tiny home, you want to make sure you get a property that ticks all your boxes.
But guess what, when it comes to finding your dream house, you need to do your due diligence.
By due diligence, we mean taking extra steps to ensure the tiny house you intend to buy has everything intact.
Here are some responsibilities you must take as a tiny home buyer.
Ensure you inspect the property
After you must have spoken to the tiny home seller, the next thing you need to do is arrange a convenient time to have the property inspected.
While you can do this by yourself, we always recommend opting for the services of an expert.
With an expert, you’re sure to get all the answers you’re looking for.
Do a mold inspection
While doing a house inspection, you must pay special attention to a mold inspection.
Although a professional inspector will most likely focus on the surface, you get to know what’s happening behind the wall with a mold inspection.
You should never forget that small spaces can become pretty humid and can become a nightmare if not quickly addressed.
If you settle for a tiny model home that’s been sitting for some time or small second-hand home, you should be ready to spend a couple of hundred dollars to get the mold inspection done.
Trust us when we say you don’t want to find out the hard way, especially if you have to deal with a considerable mold problem.
Make sure the property has a clear title
When you go for a traditional house, the realtor you’re dealing with will most likely work with a title company to guarantee a clear title.
For those new to the real estate space, a clean title means that the individual selling the home has the right to do so.
Also, a clean title suggests that there are no errors in the paperwork.
No one can come out of the blue to lay claim to your home with a clean property title.
Trus us when we say the last thing you want to deal with is a distraught spouse or stepchild with the proper paperwork, laying claims to your property.
Unfortunately, since zoning codes and laws don’t fully recognize tiny homes, it means you can’t rely on a title company for assistance with this.
But guess what, there is a loophole to get around this.
One way is to run the VIN on your trailer via the DMV.
This will let you know whether or not the trailer is registered to the person you’re buying the property from.
It will also help if you look at the seller’s driving license to make sure they are who they say they are.
Once you have completed the transaction, the next thing is to apply for a new title as you want to be registered as the new owner.
Note: Since many DMV’s require a physical inspection, you must have this done before parking your new home.
Also, make sure you don’t use the term tiny home at the DMV.
Instead, let the DMV know that you want to register your travel trailer since that’s what tiny homes are technical.
Do a deep internet dive and speak to the neighbors
Before you settle for any tiny home deal you come across, always make sure you do your homework.
While you may be lucky to buy your home from a seller that is upfront with you right from the get-go, some tiny home sellers could sometimes lie about the condition of the home they have listed for sale.
To this end, it won’t hurt to sweep through Facebook, Instagram, speak to neighbors and ask one or two questions about the property you intend to buy.
This should give you the scoop, especially if the seller weren’t very honest with you from the very onset.
Even though your inspector should spot anything crazy, it won’t hurt to get a second opinion, especially from those who live close to the seller.
Make sure the property has all the necessary certification
A tiny home with third-party certifications shows that such a property was designed and built safely and legally.
While not all financiers or insurance companies require homeowners to have all certificates, we are sure that these certifications could become mandatory as the tiny home industry continues to win ground and become mainstream.
Just so you know, certifications for tiny homes can be a little tricky, and that’s because there are several of them.
Plus, no one knows how things can change in the future.
Imagine moving to a new city that requires a different certification than the one you currently have?
Or stop for a second to imagine the primary credentials changing as the industry evolves?
While these are pretty important questions, always remember that the tiny home industry is an evolving one that will go through massive changes in the years to come.
At the end of the day, we want you to always remember that certifications give a level of assurance and will become super important in the tiny home industry.
Even though we may not deep dive into the finer prints of certifications, always ensure the seller issues you one if you have been promised during negotiations.
Also, make sure you have the agreement in writing before making any payment.
Another thing you can do is reach out to the certification company to know how legit the document is.
The legal aspect of selling a tiny home?
The tiny home movement has continued to gain momentum since 2007 after Jay Shafer gave Oprah Winfrey a tour of his tiny home structure.
Today, there are roughly over 10,000 small homes in the U.S.
More so, over 500 million Americans are open to buying a tiny home, and guess what?
Your home could be just that one that attracts a suitable buyer.
While over 30,000 tiny homes are listed for sale every year, the number has risen sharply as more people show interest in simple living.
Unfortunately, selling a small home can be pretty intimidating, especially when you factor in all the legal aspects of the deal.
On the one hand, you need to ensure that your tiny home structure meets all zoning codes and regulations.
Another thing you need to get right is making sure the property has all the necessary permits.
If it doesn’t, then it may affect the value of your home as no one would like to invest in a property that is missing all the necessary documents.
Tiny homes: Do they appreciate?
The sad reality is that tiny home structures don’t hold their value.
According to experts in this niche, the value of tiny houses is more closely associated with mobile homes and cars than with conventional structures.
What we mean here is that small homes tend to depreciate just as fast as RVs, cars, double wides, and more.
That said, if you’re pretty serious about maintaining the value of your tiny home, you need to ensure that it is in pristine condition.
While heat, inclement weather, and other conditions can cause wear and tear over time, regular maintenance should keep your home in excellent condition.
How much can I sell my tiny house?
Having shown you some tips on how to sell a tiny home on wheels, it’s time to run you through the numbers, especially as it concerns how much you can sell your home.
When it comes to how much you can sell your tiny home, we can’t put a definite price tag as it all depends on the condition of your home.
We are sure you won’t compare the price of a new home to one that has probably been used for several years.
That said, if you have a custom-built home that is in excellent condition, you should still be able to get top dollar.
But in terms of pricing, we can’t put a specific price tag on your home.
Frequently asked questions
What exactly does a seller need to sell a tiny house?
Selling a tiny home isn’t among the easiest things to do, but guess what, if you’re able to capture great pictures of your home, price your home correctly, have it listed on great tiny home websites, and ensure it meets all zoning and building code requirements, flipping your home wouldn’t be as difficult as you imagine.
What are the pitfalls of selling your tiny?
One of the downsides of selling your tiny home is that you may end up selling it for a lower price than you bought it, and that’s because these structures don’t hold value.
Even when kept in pristine condition, you may still not get top dollar for it.
Do you need a permit for your tiny home structure?
When it comes to building permits for tiny homes, there are a few grey areas.
While some states have favorable tiny home laws, others still haven’t opened their doors to the tiny home movement.
So before deciding if this is an industry you want to explore, you need to make sure you aren’t breaking any laws with your building project.
