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Opendoor Reviews: What Is It and How It Works
HomeLight
Real Estate
2 weeks ago
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When you think of selling your home, you may imagine lengthy preparations, repairs, strangers in your house, price haggling, waiting, worrying, and trying to time the sale with a move. To bypass all these, many homeowners turn to new solutions offered by companies like Opendoor. But what is Opendoor? How does Opendoor work?

In this post, we’ll walk through the process of selling your home to this pioneering business, share Opendoor reviews, and provide a list of similar companies so you can compare your options and decide if a simple cash-offer home sale is right for you.

Interested in Selling Your House to an iBuyer?

Selling a home the traditional way can be stressful and time consuming, especially in a shifting market. Alternatively, HomeLight can provide an all-cash offer to purchase your home through our Simple Sale platform. This enables you to skip many of the typical hassles of selling a house (repairs, showings, open houses), and close in as little as 10 days.

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What is Opendoor?

Opendoor is a tech-driven real estate company that helped launch the era of iBuyers (instant buyers), companies that provide near-instant all-cash offers to buy your home. Founded in 2014, Opendoor can provide a fast, seamless way to sell your home without the traditional hassles of listings, showings, and uncertain closing dates.

At its core, Opendoor provides homeowners with a direct path to sell their houses quickly by making an almost immediate cash offer. This approach caters to those looking for a straightforward, efficient transaction, emphasizing convenience and speed.

How does Opendoor work?

The process of selling your home to Opendoor is streamlined to ensure ease and efficiency. Here’s a brief rundown of how it works:

  1. Submit your home details: You start by providing detailed information about your home on Opendoor’s website. In the next section, we’ll provide an overview of the questions you can expect.
  2. Receive an offer: Opendoor evaluates the information you’ve provided, along with local market trends and comparable sales, to make an initial cash offer for your home. This offer is typically made within 48 hours.
  3. Choose your closing date: If you accept Opendoor’s offer, you have the flexibility to choose a closing date that works for you, anywhere from a few days to a few months away.
  4. Inspection and adjustments: Opendoor will conduct a home assessment to verify the condition of your property. If new information arises or any repairs are needed, they might adjust the offer price accordingly, or you may choose to make the repairs or changes yourself.
  5. Close the sale: Once everything is agreed upon, the sale closes on your chosen date, and Opendoor handles the paperwork. You receive your payment, and Opendoor takes possession of the home.

What questions will Opendoor ask about my home?

When requesting an offer through Opendoor’s online questionnaire, you’ll first be asked to enter your home’s address. Then the automated platform will ask you to confirm or provide details about your property and selling plans. The order and nature of the questions will look similar to this:

  • Number of bedrooms
  • Full and partial bathrooms
  • Square footage (above ground)
  • Floors (above ground)
  • Whether you have a basement
  • Year built
  • Pool or other amenities
  • Garage or carport
  • Kitchen countertops
  • Describe each room (fixer-upper, dated, standard, high end, luxury)
  • Describe the home’s exterior
  • If your home is in an HOA, a gated or age-restricted community
  • Other details such as solar panels, foundation issues, fire or water damage, septic system, asbestos siding, horse property, mobile or manufactured home
  • Selling timeline (ASAP, 2-4 weeks, 4-6 weeks, 6+ weeks, just browsing)

At the end of the questionnaire, a prompt will appear saying, “See your estimated offer right away.“ To continue, you’ll be required to create an account, which can be done with Google, Facebook, or your email address.

How does Opendoor estimate its cash offer?

Opendoor’s cash offer is calculated through a combination of advanced technology and real estate expertise. At the heart of its process is a sophisticated algorithm that analyzes data points across multiple factors to help ensure a fair and competitive offer.

To make an offer on your home, Opendoor primarily relies on three things:

  • The information you provide about your home’s condition, features, and updates
  • A robust data model of market trends and recently sold homes
  • Opendoor’s team of experienced local pricing and property assessment experts

On its website, the company provides this clarifying statement: “We don’t try to make ‘low ball offers’ because, unlike a home flipper, our business model isn’t based on buying low and selling high. The way we make money is by charging a fee for our service.”

This approach aims to balance speed and convenience with fairness, providing sellers with a viable cash offer option.


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