Sell your house fast in Montgomery County, Maryland

Fast in Montgomery County has a county code standing in its way. Before a single-family house can settle here, someone has to run a radon test dated inside the last year, the seller has to hand over twelve months of utility bills, and if the house is in an HOA the buyer’s lender waits on the resale package. A financed retail sale in Silver Spring, Rockville or Gaithersburg absorbs all of that and runs 45 to 60 days from contract. A cash sale to us runs two to three weeks from the first call, and we carry the county’s paperwork ourselves.

Day one: the address, the condition, a written number

You tell us where the house is and what shape it is in. A 1950s brick rambler in Silver Spring or Wheaton with the original kitchen, a Gaithersburg townhouse with a tenant, a Bethesda lot a builder has been circling, all fine. We look in person or on video, and within a day you have a written offer with the math shown: what the house is worth fixed up, what the work costs, what our margin is. The number does not move at closing.

What slows a Montgomery County sale, and why it does not slow ours

• The radon test. County code says a single-family house cannot settle without a radon test performed less than a year before the settlement date. Either side can run it. We order it and pay for it as the buyer, and a high reading is ours to mitigate after closing, not a reason to reprice.
• Twelve months of utility bills. Since 2009 the seller has to give the buyer the electric, gas and heating oil history for the prior year. A retail buyer’s agent will chase you for the Pepco login until settlement. We take what you have, or nothing, and close anyway.
• The recordation tiers. Recordation tax is $4.45 per $500 on the first $500,000 and steps up above that, plus a 1% county transfer tax and 0.5% to the state. A licensed Maryland title company calculates every line at settlement. You never write the check.
• A rental license or the rent cap. The county licenses every single-family rental annually through DHCA, and since July 2024 caps most rent increases. Neither one decides whether we buy. We take the house licensed or not, tenant in place or not.
• The HOA packet. Most of the 1980s and 90s townhouse stock in Gaithersburg, Germantown and Montgomery Village sits in an association. A retail buyer’s contingency period cannot start until the resale disclosure arrives. We sign first and chase the packet ourselves.

The June tax sale is the one deadline that will not wait

Montgomery County sells liens on unpaid county taxes at a sealed-bid sale on the second Monday in June, run by the Division of Treasury in Rockville. Once your lien sells, the bidder collects interest on top of the taxes and can eventually move to foreclose your right to redeem. A listing that goes under contract in May almost never closes in time. A cash closing scheduled before the sale pays the county out of your proceeds at settlement and the lien is never sold. If you are reading this in April with a delinquent bill, call us before you call an agent.

Week two or three: closing on your date

A licensed Maryland title company runs settlement: title search, mortgage payoff, any tax lien or HOA balance cleared from proceeds, the balance wired to you. If you need longer than three weeks, because an estate is still with the Register of Wills at 50 Maryland Avenue or a parent is moving to care, you pick the date and the price holds. A sale by a personal representative is one of the transfers the county exempts from the radon rule, which removes a step for estates. Our guides on selling an inherited house and on relocating on a deadline cover the two timelines we work most. The county page, with every rule above in full, is at we buy houses in Montgomery County.