When you’re getting ready to sell your home, you have a lot of choices to make. When to list and sell, where you want to move to, and how much money you hope to make. If you’re a “do-it-yourself” type, you might be considering another choice — selling your house without a Realtor.

For most sellers, saving on real estate agent commission fees is the biggest appeal to selling by owner. But before you make the decision based on money alone, make sure you have a good grasp of the process and the amount of work involved.

Joel Carson is a top real estate agent in Salt Lake City, Utah with 33 years of experience helping home sellers and buyers in all kinds of housing markets. He points out that, “It’s the largest transaction that people do in their life. Without having a professional who does this for a living looking over documents and making sure the seller understands all aspects — that the buyer gets a proper inspection, and communicating what expectations buyers should have of the seller to make repairs — a lot of that is lost.”

He thinks that “for sale by owner,” or FSBO, sellers can sometimes underestimate all the moving pieces that go into a successful real estate sale. We’ll break them down for you — identifying the pros and cons of each option as well as basic steps to follow if you decide to sell your house without a Realtor.