If you've sold a house in PA....

MrsJenniferS

What/how much were the closing costs for you as the seller? DH and I live in NJ but have an investment property in PA that we want to sell. The process is much different in NJ, so I was wondering if anyone has had experience with selling home and how much $ they had to come up with. Also - did the capital gains kill you the fillowing year on your income taxes?? TIA!

nj67ws56qa21

What exactly do you mean by closing costs?  Do you want to pay the buyer's closing costs, or just your own?  Typically, if you use a realtor and are just paying your own closing costs, you'll end up paying the realtor's commission/fee, and some relatively minor fees for document prep and that sort of thing.  If you are taking a loss, you may have to bring extra money to the closing table, too.  Your best bet is probably to talk to a local realtor in the area you plan to sell...and if you anticipate capital gains, maybe a tax lawyer, too.    

MrsJenniferS

We're not planning on paying the buyers' closing costs, just our own. We don't expect to take a loss either. I remember as a buyer in NJ, the closing costs were unreal - like $10K. I know we'd have to pay realtor commission and document prep, etc...but anything else that would account for a large chunk of change?

nj67ws56qa21

There shouldn't be much else (at least from when we sold our house last year there wasn't).  If you are expecting a profit on it, they'll just deduct your realtor fee (if you even use one) from your profit and you won't have to bring anything to the table.  And hopefully, you'll get to walk away with a nice check to take to the bank!

dimples41479

Not as a seller, closing costs are minor unless you are helping the buyer out.

RaeAnt

Agreed. Unless you are helping the buyer, you wouldn't be paying "closing costs" per se. Depending on the home area it's in, and homes price though, it may behoove you to pay at least something toward closing costs. Also just because you sell a home doesn't mean you will owe capital gains. However, since it's an investment property, I'm not positive on that. This worksheet may help.

http://www.1031x.com/Capital-Gains-Pennsylvania.cfm

http://taxes.uslegal.com/capital-gains/capital-gains-and-the-sales-of-homes/

http://www.paytaxeslater.com/stepup.htm

http://www.teenanalyst.com/taxes/capitalgainstaxsecondhome.html

nj67ws56qa21

After looking at our taxes this weekend, I realized there was another bigger fee we had to pay at closing as a seller, the PA transfer tax.  The transfer tax is 2% of the sale price of the house, split between the buyer and seller.  So our % was 1% of the sale price.