Outgrowing Your First Home? Buying and Selling a Home in Birmingham, Alabama

They weren't just buying a home. They needed to sell one, too.

Sometimes your first home does exactly what it was supposed to do.

You buy it. You make it yours. You fall in love with the neighborhood. You build memories there.

And then life changes.

Maybe another baby is on the way. The bedrooms suddenly feel smaller. Storage is disappearing. The playroom has taken over the living room. Or the home you once thought had plenty of space simply doesn't work as well for the family you've become.

That was the case for our clients, Savannah and Gage.

We first helped them buy their home in 2021. Five years later, they still loved their home and their community—but their family was growing, and they knew they needed more space.

As Savannah shared:

“After five years of loving our home and the community, we decided it was time to look for our next home, as our family was growing and we needed more space.”

This time, their move came with an additional challenge:

Where Do You Start When You Need to Sell AND Buy?

This is often the part that keeps homeowners from making a move.

You may know you need more space, but then the questions start:

What could our current home sell for? How much equity do we have? What can we comfortably spend on the next home? Do we sell first or buy first? What happens if we find the right house before ours sells?

We don't expect our clients to have those answers before they call us.

Figuring them out is part of our job.

For Savannah and Gage, we started building a plan for both sides of the move—preparing their current Hoover home for the market while also helping them search for the home that would give their growing family the space they needed.

A Fast Home Sale Starts Before Listing Day

Savannah mentioned something in her review that we think is important:

“From giving us selling tips, helping stage our home to sell, sending us potential homes to promptly booking showings, and communicating efficiently with other listing agents, they were always available, responsive, and honest.”

That's a pretty accurate picture of what happens behind the scenes when we're coordinating a sale and purchase at the same time.

Before their home went on the market, we walked through it together, made recommendations about what was worth doing before listing, helped stage the home using what they already owned, studied the competition and recent sales, and developed our pricing and launch strategy.

Then came photography, marketing and showing preparation.

Their Hoover home went under contract within 12 hours of going active.

Every home and market is different, and no agent can promise that result. But their experience is a great example of why we believe the work done before a home hits the market can be just as important as what happens afterward.

Meanwhile, We Were Buying the Next Home

This is where selling and buying simultaneously can get complicated.

While one side of the move involves preparing a home, marketing it, managing showings and negotiating a sale, the other involves searching for properties, scheduling tours, evaluating value, communicating with listing agents and preparing an offer.

With Savannah and Gage, those two processes were happening together.

Within less than a week, they were under contract on their new home—and their current home was under contract as well.

That's also one of the reasons Chad and I value our two-agent approach so much. We're able to divide responsibilities between the sale and purchase while still working from one strategy.

From First-Time Buyers to Their Next Home

This may be our favorite part of their story.

In 2021, Savannah and Gage trusted us to help them buy their first home.

In 2026, they trusted us to help them sell that home and buy the one their family needed next.

Savannah ended her review with:

“Macey and Chad are the best of the best and we will recommend them time and time again!”

Of course we're incredibly grateful for those words.

But what means even more is that when their life changed, they knew who they wanted to call.

That's the relationship we want with our clients.

We're not interested in simply helping someone complete one transaction. We want to know your family, understand what matters to you and be here when real estate becomes part of your life again—whether that's five years from now or fifteen.

Have You Outgrown Your Birmingham-Area Home?

You don't have to dislike your current home to know it's time for another one.

Sometimes a home can hold some of your favorite memories and still no longer fit the life you're living today.

And if the thought of “But we'd have to sell this house first…” is what's keeping you from exploring what's next, that's exactly where we can help.

We can start by looking at what your current home could realistically sell for, your potential equity, what you want from your next home and how the selling and buying timelines could work together.

You don't have to be ready to list.

You just need a place to start.

We're Chad and Macey Franklin of Franklins of Bham, a husband-and-wife real estate team with LAH Sotheby's International Realty helping clients buy and sell homes throughout Birmingham, Hoover, Vestavia Hills, Homewood, Mountain Brook and surrounding Central Alabama communities.