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
Your listing goes into the MLS, which passes it along to the public home-search sites. Photos go up, and buyers tour it at showings and open houses. Buyers and agents all get their first look at the same moment.
When owners often choose it: Reaching the most buyers and getting a full test of price come first, and your calendar allows for prep, showings and escrow.
Tradeoffs: Look for more showings, plus a price history that’s open for anyone to see. Prep money gets spent before the sale. Once you’ve said yes to an offer, escrow usually runs 30 to 45 days, and after the inspection the buyer may ask for repairs or a credit.
Pre-market or Coming Soon
Fewer buyers get an early look here, sometimes before the home goes public and sometimes in place of a public launch altogether. The home might be listed as Coming Soon, held back as a delayed-marketing listing, or kept as an office-only listing inside one brokerage.
When owners often choose it: You care most about privacy, about choosing when and how buyers see the home, or about flexible terms such as a move-out date that suits your orders.
Tradeoffs: With a narrower pool of buyers, you may get fewer offers side by side and a weaker read on what the market would pay. SDMLS allows up to 30 days of Coming Soon and CRMLS up to 21, and neither lets buyers tour in person. You sign a seller form first. Zillow has its own rule as well: a home that’s marketed publicly without reaching the MLS inside one business day gets no spot on Zillow or Trulia during the full run of that listing agreement.
As-is or cash offer
A cash buyer takes the home as it is, often after touring it only once. Plug in a real offer, and the column’s math uses that buyer’s figure.
When owners often choose it: Speed matters most, or you’d rather skip repairs and showings and deal with fewer contingencies.
Tradeoffs: With cash, you often give up some price for a quick, sure close, so offers tend to land under open-market value, and every offer is different. Look closely at who pays each cost, the buyer or you. Many cash deals reach closing in 1 to 3 weeks, but the timeline is up to the buyer.
Rent it out, sell later
A tenant moves in after you move out, and you sell later, after the number of years you choose.
When owners often choose it: The rent would cover a good share of the monthly cost, selling later suits your plans, or future orders might bring you back to San Diego.
Tradeoffs: You’ll pay a property manager or give your own time, and you’ll budget for repairs and months with no tenant. Local rent and notice rules apply. Years as a rental can change your federal tax exclusion on the home sale. The usual test is at least 2 years of ownership and 2 years of living there, both inside the 5 years before you sell. A CPA can check your dates.
Keep the home
Staying means you keep the home and live there as before. With no sale, selling costs are zero for now.
When owners often choose it: The house still lines up with your plans, you’d rather not give up the terms on your current loan, or your next move has no date yet.
Tradeoffs: The equity you’ve built remains in the home rather than in your bank. Each month still brings the loan payment, tax, insurance and upkeep. Later value rests with the market, and the growth rate you choose is your own estimate, not a prediction.
Pre-market and coming-soon sales: the rules
Rules for quiet or early marketing come from three places: national REALTOR® policy, whichever MLS handles your listing, and your brokerage. Home-search sites such as Zillow keep standards of their own.
Nationally, NAR (the National Association of REALTORS®) has kept its Clear Cooperation Policy in force. Public marketing covers a lot, from a yard sign or flyer to a public website, an email blast or a network shared among several brokerages. Once it starts, the listing broker must get the home into the MLS within one business day. Another NAR policy, in place since March 25, 2025, is Multiple Listing Options for Sellers, and it adds two alternatives to the full public listing route. A delayed-marketing listing is visible to other agents inside the MLS, while public home-search sites hold off for a period the MLS chooses. An office-only listing is filed with the MLS yet kept inside the listing brokerage, so agents at other firms never receive it and nothing is advertised to the public. Both begin with a disclosure the seller signs.
Every San Diego County listing lands in one of two MLSs. SDMLS is the San Diego MLS, and CRMLS is the California Regional MLS. Each sets its own rules.
SDMLS allows a Coming Soon listing for as long as 30 days. Agents in the MLS can view the listing, and you may promote it and accept an offer, though no buyer can walk through it and there are no open houses. SDMLS holds these listings back from IDX, the feed other brokers use to display listings on their websites, and from public portals as well. Once Active, a listing has no way back to Coming Soon. SDMLS treats NAR’s delayed-marketing choice its own way: an Active listing that’s hidden from the internet, can stay that way indefinitely, and may be shown in person.
In CRMLS, a Coming Soon listing lasts no more than 21 days and then switches to Active. No showings of any kind can happen, and every ad must carry the Coming Soon label. Most of these listings flow out to IDX feeds and to big portals like Homes.com and Realtor.com. Signing a form that’s new in 2026 lets a seller opt out of IDX. Leaving Coming Soon is final, so there’s no switching back later. CRMLS doesn’t have a delayed-marketing status, and it treats any listing kept out of the MLS as one that can be marketed only inside the brokerage.
California sellers mark their MLS choices on the Multiple Listing Service Addendum from C.A.R., called the MLSA. That form was updated by C.A.R. in September 2025, and each MLS may want its own paperwork too. The NAR disclosure confirms the seller understands what’s being given up, such as the broad, immediate reach a home gets through the MLS.
Zillow’s Listing Access Standards add a separate rule: if public marketing starts and the MLS entry comes later than one business day, Zillow and Trulia leave the home out while that listing agreement is in effect. There’s also a waiver: Zillow wants the seller’s signature on a form explaining the drawbacks if the home won’t be publicly marketed.
This area of policy has been revised more than once since 2025, and each brokerage is free to add its own rules. Before any quiet marketing starts, Rudy checks which MLS your home falls under and which rules match your dates.
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
- These are planning figures built from what you entered. They aren’t appraisals, offers or forecasts.
- Commission is always open to negotiation and gets written into your listing agreement. The selling costs shown use your rates.
- Each month until closing adds holding costs, which the tool totals from your loan interest plus HOA dues, insurance and property tax.
- Money you get at closing and the same amount years from now aren’t equal. The rent and keep math also skips income tax, depreciation and any earnings the cash might bring in along the way.
- Tax on any gain is left out. The home-sale exclusion depends on your details, so check it with a CPA, above all when a rental period comes first.
Questions owners ask
Can I sell my VA-financed home before it shows up on public websites?
Sometimes, yes, within your MLS’s rules. In SDMLS, Coming Soon can keep a home away from public home-search sites for as many as 30 days. You can accept an offer in that window, though in-person tours aren’t allowed. CRMLS caps Coming Soon at 21 days, bars every kind of showing, and usually lets the listing appear on Realtor.com and Homes.com. With an office-only listing, there’s no public marketing at all. Each one starts with a form you sign, and Rudy confirms which rules apply to your home.
What should I gather from my lender before I fill this in?
Your lender’s payoff statement shows exactly what you owe. Your loan statement shows your interest rate, and you’ll want the years left on the loan too. Your lender can also explain how selling or renting affects your VA entitlement. Rudy is a real estate agent, so loan questions belong with your lender.
If I rent the home out while I’m stationed elsewhere, what changes?
Rent arrives each month, and so do costs: management, whether you hire it out or do it yourself, plus upkeep and gaps between tenants. Local rent and notice rules apply. Taxes are part of it too: the federal home-sale exclusion can shield as much as $250,000 in gain, or $500,000 for a joint return, and it generally requires owning and living in the home for at least 2 of the 5 years before you sell. A CPA can walk you through how a rental stretch lines up with that test.
Is there a standard commission rate?
There isn’t one. Commission is negotiable, and you settle on it in your listing agreement. Whatever rate you type flows into three columns: rent-then-sell, open-market and pre-market. Run a couple of different rates and watch the totals change.
How long might an open-market sale take from today?
Add up prep time, the weeks on the market and escrow, which is commonly 30 to 45 days from the offer you accept. Put that total, in months, in the open-market box. Each month adds holding costs, so try a short and a long estimate. Rudy plans backward from your report date or move date.
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