When many people think of a real estate sale, they immediately groan at the thought of dealing with real estate agents. More painful, for many, is the thought of paying a six percent commission to an agent. In the last five years, the real estate market has seen a significant increase in the number of people who sell their home without using agents.

A property sold without a real estate agent is known as a FSBO, which simply means for sale by owner. If you take a look at the real estate classifieds in the Sunday edition of your local paper, you should see plenty of FSBO listings. With the increasing popularity of the Internet, there are numerous sites such as FSBOAmerica.org that provide national listings online for free viewing by potential buyers. This is giving rise to a fundamental change in the real estate industry.

Prior to the Internet exploding onto the scene, selling or buying real estate could be a major time killer. One typically signed on with a real estate agent to get listed in the multiple listing services. If you wanted to find a buyer, you needed to be in the listing and have open houses and so on.

Many buyers, however, now look to Internet listing sites to develop a list of homes they are interested in. These sites typically contain detailed information on the homes as well as numerous pictures. Put another way, the buyer no longer has to spend entire weekends looking at homes that simply don’t interest him or her. The buyer can now do all of the initial work online. If they decide to come see your property, they are already pretty serious about making an offer and typically just want to make sure the pictures and information are accurate.

For many sellers, the power of the Internet makes real estate agents an unnecessary expense. Why pay six percent of the sales price as a commission when buyers are coming from online listings of the site? As a seller, you can create these listings online and expect to pay twenty five dollars or so a month to keep your listing up. With this being the case, why would you pay a commission to an agent?

If your goal is to sell a home for free, without a real estate commission, the Internet is your best option. Real estate transactions are very straightforward and you can pick up all the forms you’ll need at the local book store.