As Thanksgiving approaches, we often get the question, “Should I wait to go on the market until after the holidays?” or “My home is on the market now, should I take it off during the holidays?”.

Well, the answer is “It depends“!

Here are some things you might want to consider if you’re thinking of selling your home during the holidays (and you can search here to see how many homes are for sale in Northern Virginia right now!):

Memorial Day Weekend is the unofficial start of the “summer season”. And while most people think Spring is the best time to sell your home, we think summer is a great time also. In previous years, the standard time to get from ratifying a contract on a home to the actual settlement & moving in day was about 60-90 days. As technology has advanced, timeframes have become much shorter and the norm now is about 30 days.

What that means is the summer market has been extended. Home buyers with children in school – whether elementary school or college – often try to time their home purchases so they will be settled in their new home by the time school starts. When it took 60-90 days to get to settlement, that meant they had to be under contract by May or June. Now that loans can be processed quicker and timeframes in general are much faster, that means families can purchase a home in July – even in August – and still move in by the time school starts.