You might have seen the ads on bus stops with the handsome Scott Brothers advertising for Properly and wondered what all the buzz was about like I did. With Canadian real estate prices going ridiculously through the roof, you might be interested in adding this tool into your tool belt when it comes to buying and selling your next home. In this post you’ll learn about what Properly is, how it works, and the pros and cons of Properly. Here’s my Properly review.
What is Properly?
Properly is a new kind of real estate brokerage that is transforming the home buying and selling process with unique tools and technology. Properly arms customers with the data they need and unlocks equity they already own to make real estate customer-centric, simple and stress-free.
Properly was co-founded by Anshul Ruparell, Sheldon McCormick, and Craig Dunk in 2018. Today they have a total of $160 million secured in funding.
The problem that most home owners face when buying a home is shopping for a new home, and then buying the new home with the subject of selling your old home.
In this heated real estate market (especially in Vancouver and Toronto areas) many homes are being sold without any subjects, not even subject to inspection.
There is low home inventory in Vancouver, and bidding wars are rampant.
With Properly you can buy your next home, move into your next home, then worry about selling your home later.
And if, in the rare case, you don’t sell your home in the specific time frame and in between closing dates, Properly will actually BUY it from you for the previously agreed upon sale price if your home doesn’t sell in a few months.
If Properly buys your home directly, they’ll still try to sell it for the highest amount possible. If they end up selling your home at a higher price than they paid, they’ll refund 100% of the upside back to you.
Their focus is to make real estate more customer-centric.
Where is Properly Available in Canada?
Currently Properly is only available in select cities in Canada with the intention to expand to more cities in Canada, these are:
- Vancouver and the Fraser Valley (Properly recently became available in Vancouver as of early 2022)
- Toronto and the GTA
Specifically, the Greater Toronto regions are: The City of Toronto, Durham region, Peel region, York region, and Halton region.
In Greater Vancouver, this includes the cities of Vancouver, North Vancouver, West Vancouver, Burnaby, Richmond, Maple Ridge, Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam, Pitt Meadows, New Westminster, Delta, Surrey, Langley, Abbotsford, Port Moody, and Tsawwassen.
How Does Properly Make Money?
Properly makes money by collecting commissions- the same as if you were using a traditional real estate agent to sell or buy your home. The real estate commissions are based on what is commonly found in your local city.
In the Greater Toronto area, this is a flat 5% real estate fee.
On a $1,000,000 home, this amounts to $50,000 in real estate commission shared between both buyer and seller realtors.
In the Greater Vancouver area, this is 7% on the first $100k, 3% on the remaining balance.
On a $1,000,000 home this amounts to $7,000 + $27,000= $34,000 for both buying and selling realtors.
Essentially, the commission is the same as if you were to use a traditional real estate agent, but you get more in value:
As part of Properly’s dedication to providing value for the real estate customer, they home staging, photography, and marketing is included in their service offerings, in addition to offering Sales Assurance.
What is Properly Sale Assurance?
Sale Assurance allows homeowners to unlock equity in their current home before selling so that they can buy their next home much more easily.
Sale Assurance can act like a firm sale on your property, so you can get approved for the financing you need to buy a new home before you sell your current place.
According to this Vancouver Sun article, they have not had to buy a property from a customer in the last 18 months.
However, if In the rare occasion that your house doesn’t sell within the Sale Assurance agreement term of 90-150 days, Properly will buy your home. If it sells for a higher price than they paid to you, Properly will refund 100% of the gain back to you.
Sale Assurance helps you obtain bridge financing, meaning you can act fast when you find the home you love and avoid worrying about lining up your purchase and sale dates.
If you decide that you don’t want to proceed with selling your home to Properly, you can always cancel the Sale Assurance contract altogether. Sale Assurance is Properly’s one-way commitment to you, and you’re not locked in.
** As of 2022 Properly has paused Sales Assurance because of the volatility of the Canadian real estate market**
This Properly review will go over the benefits and drawbacks of Properly.
Pros of Properly
Sell your home fast. If you are in a rush to sell your condo and the real estate market is down, this is a good option because of the Sale Assurance guarantee. I sold my condo in a slower market and it was stressful waiting to see if there were any offers after showings. Properly homes sold 70% faster than the market average in 2021.
Convenience. Moving homes is stressful enough, knowing that you can move into your new place without selling your older place beforehand gives you a priceless peace of mind. You won’t have to match up the closing dates hoping the stars will align. You won’t have to get your young toddlers out of the house for showings.
Included professional cleaning and staging. I personally paid over $2500 to stage my small one bedroom apartment and even though it was expensive, I thought staging was worth it. Most full service realtors don’t usually include professional cleaning and staging. Having your place professionally cleaned will make it much easier to sell.
Professional photography. Professional photography is so important nowadays when listings are all found online. This is included with Properly.
Financial peace of mind. Nothing is more stressful than managing two gigantic sized mortgages. With Properly you don’t have to worry about managing two mortgages while you are in between moving homes. You might also have a ‘one up’ against the other offer if you don’t have ‘subject to sale of current home’ as one of your subjects. Properly will help cover your mortgage payments and bridge loan interest.
Good reviews. Properly has over 120 5/5 star reviews on Google.
Cons of Properly
Can’t negotiate the fees. As you can see above, on a 7-figures home, the real estate fees are very large and can really add to your closing costs when you sell. With some full service realtors you can negotiate the commission. For example, with One Percent Realty they have lower commissions.
Might not get top dollar for your property. Although with Properly Sale Assurance they calculate using recently sold homes, current homes on the market etc. you still might not be able to accurately capture the best sales price for your property (though you will have a guaranteed buyer at least- Properly). However, in 2021, Properly homes still sold over 11% over asking on average.
The Sales Assurance price is fixed. (Sales Assurance currently not offered) I know the realtors I worked with in the past assessed the recent sales and provided a suggested listing price, I declined the suggested listing price both times and increased it. The realtor wants the home sold and they don’t care as much about the final sale price as you because their commission is a smaller portion of it. I was able to negotiate the sale price of my condo. The suggested sale price of your property is fixed with Sale Assurance.
How Much Is your Home Worth?
This Properly review will go over how much your home is worth.
If you’re interested in how much your home is worth on the market right now, you can try out Properly’s accurate home valuation report, it’s free to try and always up-to-date (within the last two weeks anyway).
In fact, the AI (artificial intelligence) behind Properly’s Instant Estimate factors in over one million actual sold homes, is on average over 93% accurate, and is considered Canada’s most accurate free home value calculator.
To calculate and estimate your property, they factor in the market update, actual sold prices of nearby and comparable homes, and also current comparable homes being listed.
They even have a middle, lower, and upper range for you to evaluate.
It’s kind of like checking your free credit score- Why not?
It’s free to check, plus, your home value estimate updates every two weeks, and whenever you edit your home facts, so you get the most accurate home value estimate.
Instant Estimate from Properly is only available for homes in the Greater Toronto area (City of Toronto, Durham Region, Peel Region, York Region, Simcoe County, Dufferin County, and Halton Region).
Currently Instant Estimate is not available for Greater Vancouver but it is coming soon.
Who Would Benefit from Using Properly?
People who would benefit from using Properly would be people who would rather opt for convenience and less stress with the buying and selling process than try to time the market and get top dollar for their property.
If you are a millennial with young children or beloved pets, life is already stressful enough. Moving into a new home is already stressful enough. Spending your only free time house hunting, engaging in bidding wars, having rejected offers is even more stressful. And if you add all the stuff like strollers, buggies, kids equipment and toys associated with having young children at home, makes for a very difficult time to properly ‘show’ your current home.
Let alone having to leave your home for two hours with your pet (and clean up all the pet fur and evidence of a pet so your home is “showing friendly”).
If you are interested in having professional cleaning, staging, and a seamless real estate process (especially if you are selling and buying in a buyer’s market and not a seller’s market), this would be beneficial for you.
If you are planning to use a full service real estate brokerage anyway but also are interested in perks like staging and cleaning Properly would be an excellent option because you will be getting more value for your commission dollar.
You could buy, move, and THEN sell with Properly Sales Assurance.
You may also be interested in:
- Real Estate crowdfunding in Canada
- Square One home insurance review
- How to save money on home insurance in Vancouver
- 6 Single Female Home Buyer Tips for your First Condo
- Home budgeting tips
Have you used Properly?
What is your Properly review?
GYM is a 30 something millennial interested in achieving financial freedom through disciplined saving, dividend and ETF investing, and living a minimalist lifestyle. Before you go, check out my recommendations page of financial tools I use to save and invest money. Don’t forget to subscribe for blog updates, a free dividend yield spreadsheet, and the free Young Money Bootcamp eCourse.
The idea that they would try to sell your home for more than they paid you for it just to give you back all of the increased sales price can’t work as a business model. Unless I missed something Properly has zero incentive to work hard just to give you more money back. No business acts on anything but self interest. I’d guess they would sell the property at exactly what they paid you for it unless they are also getting a commission on that sale as well.
@Steveark- Yes you are correct they will get a commission on that sale. They haven’t actually had to buy a property from a client for the past 18 months and hence haven’t had to sell it for more than they bought.