How much do you lose selling a house as is?
The loss tends to be smallest on a house that needs a lot of expensive work, because the repairs and the months they take eat up most of what fixing would add. It tends to be largest on a house that only needs paint and a deep clean, where the work is cheap and quick.
Start from what the house would sell for fixed up, based on recent sales of similar houses nearby. An as-is buyer takes off the cost of the repairs and then a further amount for their time, their costs and the risk of what the work turns up. That gap is the headline loss. Against it, you don't pay for the repairs, you don't carry the loan interest, taxes and insurance while a contractor works, and a cash sale has no listing commission. The real loss is the difference between what you'd net each way. To find it, set the as-is offer, less the excise tax and closing fees, next to the fixed-up value less the repairs, the months of carrying costs, the commission, the excise tax and the closing fees. On a house with only light work, the buyer still takes a margin on jobs you could have done yourself, which is where selling as is costs the most.
You'll see percentage ranges for this all over the internet. They're rough opinions, and none of them knows your roof, your sewer line or your street. The steps below work out your own.
How does an as-is buyer arrive at a price?
They work backward from the fixed-up value. A cash buyer subtracts the repairs, the cost of owning and reselling the house, and a margin. A buyer with a loan does a version of the same thing, and their lender's appraiser gets a say too.
- What it would sell for fixed
- Recent sales of updated houses close by, of similar size and age. This is the number everything else comes off.
- The repairs
- What the buyer expects the work to cost, usually with some room for what opening a wall or a roof reveals. Big jobs carry more of that room than small ones.
- Owning and reselling it
- Loan or cash costs while the work happens, property tax, insurance, utilities, and the costs of selling it again.
- The margin
- Pay for the buyer's time and the risk that the work runs long or over budget.
That's also how I price a house. I walk it with you first and work from those same four things, and you get the offer in writing within 24 hours of the walkthrough. With a clean title a sale can close in as little as 7 days, though most take longer. The full method is on the page about how I make an offer.
If you list the house as is instead, buyers with a loan bring a lender, and the lender's appraiser can hold the loan over a safety or soundness problem. That's one reason a listed fixer draws fewer offers.
What do you save by not fixing it first?
Selling as is saves more than the repair bill. The repair bill is the obvious saving. The months the house sits during the work, the selling costs on the higher price and the repair credits a buyer asks for after their inspection are the ones people forget.
- The repairs themselves, paid before you see a dollar from the sale, and the contractor's schedule on top.
- Carrying costs while the work happens: the interest on your loan, insurance and utilities. In Washington, property tax is due in two halves, by April 30 and October 31, and every month you hold the house adds to it. If a half goes unpaid, a home of up to four units is charged 9% a year interest on it.
- The listing commission, which a direct cash sale doesn't have. Commissions are negotiable and not set by law, so ask any broker what theirs is before you count it.
- The repair request after the buyer's inspection. A financed buyer's inspector writes a list, and on a listed house the seller often ends up giving a credit or a lower price for part of it.
A repair only pays if it adds more to the price than it costs, after the time it takes. Most dated kitchens and worn carpet don't clear that bar. Which fixes usually do is in what not to do before you sell.
What does a Washington seller pay either way?
Washington's real estate excise tax, the title and escrow fees and the seller disclosure come with almost every sale, fixed up or not. None of them goes away because you sell as is. The tax is charged on the price, though, so on an as-is sale it comes out a little lower.
The state rate is 1.1% on the first $525,000 of the price and 1.28% on the part from there up to $1,525,000, with higher rates above that, plus a local rate of 0.5% in Seattle and Tacoma. The Department of Revenue says the seller usually pays it, and it is typically collected at closing.
For example, take a house worth $600,000 fixed up that sells as is for $540,000. With a 0.5% local rate, the excise tax would be about $9,735 on the higher price and $8,667 on the lower one, so $1,068 of the $60,000 gap comes back to you in tax. Count it in the comparison. The dollar steps of the state rate rise on January 1, 2027.
Selling as is also doesn't excuse you from the seller disclosure statement, Form 17. You still answer in writing what you know about the roof, the water, the sewer or septic and the rest, and the buyer gets a short window to back out once they have it. The article on selling as is without an inspection covers the deadlines.
Some local checks travel with the house no matter how you sell it. In Pierce County a house on septic usually needs a Report of System Status before it sells, and in Seattle the side sewer from the house all the way to the city's main under the street is the owner's to maintain, so buyers often scope it and price what they find.
How do you work out your own number?
Put two net figures side by side: what you'd keep after fixing and listing, and what you'd keep selling as is. The gap between those two is what selling as is costs you. Each step below adds one piece of it, and you can work through all of them before you talk to a buyer or a broker.
- Get a fixed-up value from recent nearby sales of updated houses like yours.
- Get written bids for the repairs that buyers would actually notice, and add a cushion for what turns up.
- Count the months: how long the work takes plus how long the listing might sit, times the interest part of your loan payment, plus insurance, utilities and property tax.
- From the fixed-up value, take off the repair bids, those months of carrying costs, the commission you'd agree to, the excise tax and the closing fees. What's left is the fix-and-list net.
- Take the as-is offer and take off the excise tax and closing fees on it. That's the as-is net.
If you'd like help with the math, I'll put a listing estimate next to the cash offer, after the same costs, so you can see what each would leave you. The page comparing a cash offer and a listing goes through both routes in more detail. Jason Bryant is a licensed broker with Windermere Real Estate (license 101377).
When the fix-and-list net wins by a lot and you have the time and the cash for the work, fixing it is usually the better call. When the gap is small, selling as is buys you a date you can count on and no repair bills. The guide to selling a house as is in Washington covers how that sale works.
Sources
- Washington Department of Revenue, real estate excise tax (graduated rates, 2027 thresholds, filing with the county treasurer)checked
- RCW 82.45.080, the real estate excise tax is the seller's obligationchecked
- RCW 84.56.020, property tax due dates (first half by April 30, second half by October 31) and interest on delinquent tax (9% a year on residential property of four or fewer units)checked
- National Association of REALTORS, what the NAR settlement means for buyers and sellerschecked
- RCW 64.06.010, sales exempt from the seller disclosurechecked
- RCW 64.06.030, delivery of the disclosure and the buyer's right to rescindchecked
- Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department, septic Report of System Statuschecked
- Seattle Public Utilities, your side sewerchecked
