This is an estimate for planning. It is not a quote, an appraisal, an offer, a loan offer, or tax or legal advice, and Rudy is a real estate agent, not a lender or tax professional.
The five paths, in plain English
Open-market listing
A full listing: the house is put in the MLS and pushed to public search websites, with photos, open houses and showings, so every buyer and agent can see it at the same moment.
When owners often choose it: You’d like the biggest possible audience and a clear market read on price, and there’s time for getting ready, showings and escrow.
Tradeoffs: There are more visits to the home, and the price history is public. Repairs and prep are paid before closing. After you both accept an offer, escrow generally runs 30 to 45 days, and once inspections are done, repair or credit requests may follow.
Pre-market or Coming Soon
The home is offered first to a limited set of buyers, ahead of a public debut or in its place. It might be delayed marketing, Coming Soon, or an office-only listing confined to one brokerage.
When owners often choose it: Keeping things discreet, deciding when and how the home is viewed, or flexible terms like a later move-out count for more with you both than the widest audience. A ready buyer sometimes needs less prep.
Tradeoffs: A smaller audience can mean fewer offers and less evidence of what the market would pay. SDMLS allows Coming Soon for a maximum of 30 days and CRMLS for 21, with no in-person showings, and a form gets signed first. Zillow’s standards bar a home from Zillow and Trulia through the end of that listing agreement if it gets public promotion and one business day passes with no MLS entry.
As-is or cash offer
Here, the buyer pays cash and takes the house as it stands, often after one walk-through. Enter an offer you actually have, or one you want to test, and the column uses that buyer’s price.
When owners often choose it: A home that needs work, a wish for speed and fewer contingencies, or a preference to skip repairs and showings tips the scale.
Tradeoffs: For the speed and certainty they bring, cash buyers often offer under open-market value, and each offer comes with its own terms. Pin down which costs the buyer picks up and which remain yours to pay. One to three weeks to close is common, but it depends on the buyer.
Rent it out, sell later
Instead of selling now, you move out, the home is rented to a tenant, and it’s sold after the years you select.
When owners often choose it: Rental income could cover a big share of the monthly cost, selling later fits your plans, or the move might be temporary.
Tradeoffs: Expect a management fee or your own time, plus repairs and periods with no tenant in place. Local rent and notice rules apply. A rental period of several years can shift how the federal home-sale exclusion applies to you. To qualify, you must have owned the home and lived in it as your main home for 2 years or more in total during the 5-year period ending on the sale date. Check with your CPA.
Keep the home
No sale happens. The home stays owned and lived in, so there are no selling costs today. This column shows equity only, not a buyout between owners.
When owners often choose it: The home still works for you, your existing loan terms are worth holding onto, or nobody has set a move date yet.
Tradeoffs: Equity remains in the house rather than in the bank. Loan payments, property tax, insurance and upkeep continue. The home’s future value hinges on the market, so read the growth rate you pick as an assumption, not a prediction.
Pre-market and coming-soon sales: the rules
Rules for quiet or early marketing have three sources: nationwide REALTOR® policy, the MLS and the brokerage. On top of that, search sites like Zillow apply their own standards.
NAR’s Clear Cooperation Policy still applies across the country. It says the listing broker has to submit a home to the MLS no later than one business day after it is first marketed to the public. Examples of public marketing include email blasts, public-facing websites, yard signs, flyers and listing networks shared by multiple brokerages. Since March 25, 2025, NAR has also had Multiple Listing Options for Sellers, a policy that adds two choices besides the full public listing. Under delayed marketing, other agents can find the listing in the MLS, though public search sites have to wait for a period the MLS chooses. With an office-only listing, the MLS has it on file, but agents at other brokerages can’t see it and it isn’t marketed to the public. The seller signs a disclosure before using either.
In San Diego County, a home is listed with one of two MLSs, SDMLS (San Diego) or CRMLS (California Regional), and they treat these listings differently.
SDMLS lets a Coming Soon listing stay in that status for a maximum of 30 days. Agents across the MLS can view it, and the seller may promote it and even accept an offer, yet the rules allow no in-person tours or open houses. These listings are kept off public portals and out of IDX, the feed that powers listings on other brokers’ websites. After a listing goes Active, it can’t switch back. SDMLS covers the NAR delayed-marketing choice through an Active status that isn’t published online, runs with no time limit and permits buyers to visit in person.
CRMLS allows up to 21 days of Coming Soon, after which the listing switches to Active automatically. No showings of any type are allowed, and every ad must identify the home as Coming Soon. As a rule, these listings feed through to IDX and to Homes.com, Realtor.com and other portals, although a seller form added in 2026 can keep IDX from getting them. Leaving Coming Soon is one-way. There’s no delayed-marketing status in CRMLS, and CRMLS holds that a non-MLS home can’t get public promotion past its own brokerage.
Everywhere in California, the seller’s MLS decisions are written on the MLSA, C.A.R.’s MLS addendum, which saw an update in September 2025; the MLS itself may also require a separate form. Through the NAR disclosure, the seller acknowledges the tradeoff, for instance losing the wide, immediate exposure to buyers that the MLS offers.
Zillow has its own Listing Access Standards. Under those standards, if a home gets public promotion and the MLS still lacks it after one business day, it won’t appear on Zillow or Trulia during that entire listing agreement. Zillow asks for something different when a home isn’t marketed publicly: a waiver, signed by the seller, explaining the drawbacks.
These rules have been reworked repeatedly since 2025, and a brokerage is free to add policies of its own. Before dates are set, Rudy confirms which MLS your home falls under and what rules apply to it.
Rules as of 2026-10-30. Sources: NAR: Multiple Listing Options for Sellers; NAR: MLS Clear Cooperation Policy (Policy Statement 8.0); NAR: Multiple Listing Options for Sellers FAQ (May 27, 2025); NAR: Office Exclusive Listings, Pre-Marketing Guidance; SDMLS: DMEL & DMLE: What’s the Difference? (Coming Soon Status, revised July 2026); SDMLS: The SELM Is a Discontinued Form (use the C.A.R. MLSA); CRMLS: Coming Soon Status; CRMLS: Limited Exposure for Coming Soon FAQs; CRMLS: C.A.R. Form MLSA (Multiple Listing Service Addendum) FAQs; Zillow: Listing Access Standards (PDF). Your agent will confirm what applies to your home.
About these numbers
- Everything shown is an estimate from your own inputs. It isn’t an appraisal, an offer or a forecast.
- The rates you typed drive the selling costs here. The commission is always open to negotiation, and the listing agreement is where it’s set.
- Until the sale closes, each month adds holding costs, made up of property tax, HOA dues, insurance and loan interest.
- Cash at closing isn’t worth the same as cash years from now. The rent and keep columns skip income tax and depreciation, and they leave out what the money could earn if invested elsewhere.
- These figures leave out any tax on your gain. Your CPA can explain the home-sale exclusion, more so if the home will be rented before it sells.
Questions owners ask
Can the sale be handled discreetly?
It can, if that’s what you both want, and MLS rules shape how. SDMLS keeps a Coming Soon listing off public portals and IDX feeds for up to 30 days; MLS members can view it and an offer can be accepted, but no in-person showings happen. In CRMLS, Coming Soon lasts up to 21 days with no showings at all; the listing usually reaches portals, Homes.com and Realtor.com included, and signing a 2026 seller form keeps it out of IDX feeds. A more private route is an office-only listing, which isn’t marketed to the public. Rudy walks you both through the choices first.
Which forms come before any quiet marketing starts?
Under NAR’s 2025 policy, the seller signs a disclosure saying they understand which MLS benefits are being waived or delayed, such as broad, immediate exposure to buyers. California sellers also mark their choice on the C.A.R. MLS addendum (MLSA). SDMLS has its own Coming Soon form, and so does CRMLS. Rudy explains each form before anything begins.
The house needs work. How do we compare fixing it with selling as-is?
Run it both ways. In the Repairs and preparation field, put your budget, or 0 to sell it as it is; buyers may still request repairs or credits once they’ve inspected. In the cash-offer field, type a real as-is offer you have or want to test. Cash offers often trade some of the price for speed and certainty, and the page doesn’t build in any discount.
How long might each path take to close?
It depends on how ready the home is, the market and your legal timeline, and no one can promise an exact date. Selling on the open market means prep time and market time first, and then an escrow that commonly runs 30 to 45 days once you both accept an offer. Any Coming Soon stretch is capped at 30 days with SDMLS and 21 with CRMLS. Cash buyers frequently close within 1 to 3 weeks; the buyer’s own timeline decides. Each month you wait adds holding costs, and the page counts them.
Who decides the commission rate?
It’s negotiated between the two of you and your agent, and it’s written into the listing agreement. Enter the rate you think you’ll settle on. That one rate feeds three columns: open market, pre-market and the later sale in rent-then-sell. Compare a few rates to see how the amount left after the sale shifts.
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