How to Run Your First Non-Binding Offer Round as a Private Seller
You've decided: instead of putting a fixed price on your listing, you want to run a non-binding offer round to find out what buyers are actually willing to pay. The idea makes sense in principle — "let the market set the price" — but in practice it raises concrete questions: How do you set up the listing? How do you invite buyers? How do you keep track of the offers?
This guide walks through the process step by step, exactly as it works with Truvalo.
Step 1: Create your listing
In your seller dashboard, you create your listing with:
- Title and address of the property (with address autocomplete)
- Starting price — the baseline that offers relate to
- Photos — upload via drag and drop, paste from your clipboard, or import by URL, and reorder them as you like
- Description (optional)
- Link to an existing listing on a portal (optional), if you've already listed the property elsewhere
You can also configure the terms of the offer round:
- Minimum raise — e.g., each offer must be at least €1,000 higher than the previous one
- Strict minimum raises (optional) — if enabled, offers must be an exact multiple of the minimum raise
- Allow offers below the starting price (optional) — with a defined minimum offer, if you want visibility into lower offers too
- Offer deadline (optional) — a date on which the process automatically closes, if you want one
Once saved, your listing is active and ready for the first offers.
Step 2: Invite buyers after viewings
An offer round doesn't start with publishing the listing — it starts with viewings. After a buyer has seen the property and shown interest, you invite them through your dashboard:
- Enter the buyer's name and email address (and optionally a phone number).
- Optionally add a personal message — Truvalo provides pre-written templates (e.g., formal, friendly, urgent).
- The buyer receives an email with a secure, personal offer link.
What matters for your buyers: they don't need an account to open this link and place their first offer — when placing their first offer, they simply provide their name, email, and phone number, and from then on receive a sign-in link by email for any further offers. The invitation link is personal, expires after a few days, and is intended for that one buyer only.
Step 3: Track offers in real time
Once invitations go out, your dashboard and the property's detail page show you:
- every incoming offer in real time, with amount and timestamp
- the current highest offer, highlighted
- the number of offers and invited buyers
- each buyer's name, email, and phone number alongside their offer
You can add notes to individual offers or buyers — impressions from the viewing, information about financing, or a preferred handover date. If a buyer tells you they're out of the running, you can mark them accordingly so you keep a clear overview when comparing offers.
Step 4: Set a deadline — or leave it open
When creating your listing, you can set a offer deadline. If it's set and "auto-close on deadline" is enabled, the process closes automatically at that point.
Leave it blank, and the process stays open until you close it manually. This works well if you want to see how offers develop over a few days before committing to a fixed end date — you can close the offer phase at any time from the property's detail page.
Step 5: Decide
Closing the process doesn't change the offers themselves — you keep full visibility into every offer, your notes, and the buyers' information. The decision of who to move forward with is yours:
- Compare not just the offer amounts, but also your notes on financing certainty, preferred handover dates, or impressions from the viewing.
- Reach out directly to the buyer you've chosen — using the email or phone number stored in your dashboard.
- From there, the process follows the standard path for a property sale in your jurisdiction: you work out the details with the buyer, and the purchase agreement is finalized as usual (in Germany, through notarization).
Truvalo doesn't replace this final, personal step — it makes sure you go into that conversation with complete, well-organized information.
Frequently asked questions
Do I have to set an offer deadline? No, it's optional. You can close the process manually at any time.
What if I want to reopen the offer round after closing it? You can reactivate the process from the property's detail page — for example, if you want to invite more buyers.
Do buyers need to register before placing an offer? No. When placing their first offer, they provide their name, email, and phone number — there's no separate registration step.
Can I run offer rounds for multiple properties at once? Yes, each property has its own dashboard with its own invitations, offers, and settings.
Ready for your first offer round?
The whole process — from listing to decision — stays in your hands. Truvalo handles the management of invitations and offers, so you can focus on choosing the right buyer.