Putting Your House on the Market for Sale in Mexico

When you’ve decided to sell your house in Mexico, and have determined a listing price for the property, the property will need to be actively marketed for sale.

This article describes the principal ways in which homes for sale are typically marketed in Mexico.

Using a realty agent to market and sell your home

Most sellers will enlist the services of a real estate agent to help them sell their home—either on an exclusive or non-exclusive basis.

The better realty agents in Mexico are expert at ‘networking,’ and you ideally want to find one that has been operating for a considerable time, knows the local market, and has an extensive network of relevant contacts. Some agencies are affiliated with agencies outside of Mexico and might market your home to foreigners seeking property here using these affiliate networks.

How will the agent market your property?

Ask the agent how they intend to market your property before you sign-up with them.  These are the types of services good agents will offer sellers:

• Visiting your home to take professional photos and video of your property for use on your listing.  Some agents will use a drone to take aerial footage of the property as well.
• Adding a professional and attractive listing to their own website with a full and accurate description of the property.  The listing ought to be published and read well in Spanish and English to maximize the potential pool of buyers.
• Using their social media and other contact networks to promote your listing and get your property seen by as many potential buyers as possible.
• Promoting your property to the list of potential buyers they are working with.
• Adding your property as a listing on Mexico’s main property listing websites, especially Vivanuncios, Immuebles24, and MetrosCubicos.
• Advertising your home as integral part of their ad placements in local magazines, newspapers, and newsletters.
• Featuring your property in their window showcase displays at their local offices.
• Some agents will also market your property through overseas agents’ sites offering property for sale in Mexico, if they are affiliated to other agencies in that way

Exclusive and non-exclusive contracts

If you sign an exclusive contract with a realty agent, you ought to be clear about what active marketing the agent will do on your behalf, and the exclusivity should have a reasonable time limit set before it expires (6-12 months is common).

Non-exclusive contracts enable you to enlist several agents to market your property, which may give you a wider reach to potential buyers, but agents usually ask for a higher commission on non-exclusive contracts and they might invest less in advertising your home for sale if they don’t have an exclusive listing.

Realty agent commissions

Commissions are paid by the seller on the closing price.  Rates are set by negotiation and will typically range between 4% and 8%, plus Mexican sales tax (IVA) at 16%.

Most agents charge around 6%, with the lower range (4%-5%) offered to more expensive houses and the higher range (7%-8%) charged on the lowest valued homes.

The marketing, project management, and paperwork required to sell a $50,000 dollar home is almost identical to that required to sell a $5 million dollar home, and so the scale of commissions is negotiable for this reason.

When you factor in the sales tax, a 6% commission rate will add just under 7% of the home’s sales value to your closing costs.

Seller-led property marketing

Some sellers choose to bypass the services of a local realty agent and do all the marketing themselves.  This is feasible, but be aware that the agents undertake the project management related to the property transaction and if you don’t hire an agent, you’ll need to do this yourself.

When you put your home up for sale, let all your friends and family know, and direct them to your agent’s website or to you personally if there are any interested buyers.

If you want to use an agent and invest in some additional marketing, you can pay to advertise your own home in various places, asking potential buyers to contact your agent if you don’t want to deal with buyers, or to contact you directly. In the case where a buyer contacts you directly, you might negotiate a lower commission with the realty agent to manage through the sale for you.

Some ways that sellers market their own home include:

• The hanging of of a large polythene printed banner (in Spanish called a ‘rótulo’ or ‘lona’) draped on a door or wall of your home to advertise it for sale to passers-by. (Some agents provide these with their own branding and contact details.)
• Free and paid inserts on Mexico’s principal property listing sites—see the next section for a directory of these.
• Using social media, some sellers pay to ‘boost’ posts about their property for sale; these can be targeted at people in or interested in, Mexico.
• Some sellers will pay to run ads in physical or digital magazines, newspapers, or newsletters that are distributed in the area or location where the property is based
• If sellers are looking for foreign=based buyers, they might also list or pay for advertising in popular overseas listing sites like Zillow and Truilla
• Local listservs and community groups may be another way to promote the house for sale, if the moderators allow this
• Some sellers set up their own website to sell their home, creating a form of ‘electronic brochure’ to present the property in detail, and support the sales effort, whether they are using the services of a realty agent or not.  While this is an excellent way to present your home in its best light, you will still need to actively market that site: using agents, seller-led (paid) advertising, word of mouth and social media, or a combination of these.

Property sales listing sites in Mexico

These are the principal sites to check when you’re scouting for a property to rent and to gauge sales prices for homes across Mexico.

Learn more about property in Mexico

Mexperience offers detailed insights about property in Mexico for buyers, owners, renters, and sellers.

The information published in this article is provided for general information in good faith and is not intended as personal, legal, financial or investment advice.