Strategy for selling a house - what is the best way to proceed?

The question is, how much annual return has Kati made now considering all original ancillary purchase costs (including prepayment penalty). Anything in the area of 5% p.a. or higher is really great.

The question is, how much return p.a. does Kati have now considering all original purchase incidental costs (including prepayment penalty). Anything in the area of 5% p.a. or higher is tip top.

We calculated it, so we had a return of about €190 per night we spent here. :P Return is only calculated on equity as far as I know, then I would be somewhere around 240% p.a. ... Sounds a bit crazy. But in the end, it doesn't help us much, since we have to pump it back into the new property the same way. We are buying/building under the new market conditions, not the old ones anymore. Or we move into a rented apartment now and buy 2 Teslas. ;)

I know that many here come from metropolitan areas. Sometimes you just have to keep your feet on the ground.

You did exactly the right thing, congratulations on that!

I wouldn't cancel on the others now, you never know.. we informed the others that the person had accepted first and therefore now gets the first opportunity for the further process, and that we will get in touch when more details are confirmed.

So we canceled the others after the notary appointment :)

These are already very clear indications that the price was set too low.

I don't see it that way at all.

Maybe the asking price was already the upper limit for some, and with an even higher valuation they wouldn't have made it onto the list of interested parties.

You did that exactly right, congratulations!

I wouldn’t reject the others now, you never know.. we informed the others that the person accepted first and therefore now gets the first opportunity for the next steps, and that we will get in touch when more details are settled.

Thank you, thank you.
As has often been the case and proven in the course of our sales process, I will once again steal this phrasing from you and continue to use it without copyright. ;)
The formulations from Pinkiponk have also proven themselves for us. As my husband would say in English: "You guys have a way with words." :)

could you please summarize afterwards regarding the decision with or without an agent: How many hours have you invested in the sale so far? How much € would the agent have received? Agent hourly wage :p Estimated price from the agent has now even been exceeded, right? Would you have wanted an agent by your side for the viewings with the prospective buyers?

could you please summarize afterwards regarding the decision with or without an agent: How many hours have you invested so far for the sale?

I’ll skip the tidying up / preparing the living spaces now, we would have had to do that anyway. For photographing and editing the photos, I think I invested about 4-6 hours. Worth mentioning: I had a good camera and a good wide-angle lens from a private hobby. Those who don’t have something like that probably better turn to professionals for pictures. Then maybe 2-4 hours for typing up an info document / exposé, preparing an empty 3D floor plan. We listed via without-agent, cost 140€, was done in about 30 minutes (I had already prepared pictures and texts). And then there is answering and sorting messages and inquiries left. It’s hard to specify the time here because you keep spending 5-10 minutes now and then. I used the good sorting function on the portal and created a private Excel interested parties database to keep track.

How many € would the agent have gotten? Agent hourly wage :p

Both from us and from the buyers, almost 20,000€

The estimated price from the agent was even exceeded now, right?

Yes / no. The agent had told us beforehand that he rarely sells at the listing price. He wanted to "list cheaply and then see who offers the most." I didn’t like this approach that much. Then he suggested listing for 525k and expecting fewer inquiries. But he didn’t say that would be the limit. From my point of view: to make up the 20k agent commission, he would have had to sell it for at least 560. For the buyers, the property would have been 40k more expensive that way. 20k higher purchase price so we'd land back at 540k, plus 20k agent fees. I don’t think that would have been achievable. Then the buyer would have been out almost 600k and hadn’t paid any tax yet.

Would you have wished to have an agent by your side during the viewings for the interested buyers?

Not really. I found the agent we would have taken nice, but somehow also "fake" nice. You know what I mean? Somehow unauthentic. I think our authentic way of presenting the property helped with the many commitments. People didn’t have the feeling of being sold something. We pointed out everything that seemed important to us. Also the unpleasant things like settlement cracks, for example. Most interested parties knew what that was and had no problem with it, but I think you shouldn’t gloss over such things. We emphasized again that we’re not assholes. If I were a buyer, it would be important to me that people come across sincerely. That’s how we did it. And we had all the time in the world and gave that to the interested parties as well. Disclaimer: I judge this one-sidedly, since I have no experience how viewings WITH an agent go. :)