You’ve finally decided to sell your home. Word slowly spreads around town. You are ready to hire the perfect real estate agent, but then your neighbor calls. He tells you that his friends are interested in buying your home. You think, Why not, that would certainly make things easy and save the broker fee, so you invite them to take a look. They absolutely love it and offer your asking price. You are thrilled and decide to move forward. No broker, no hassle, right?

I caution you to think it through before you sign anything. In a seller’s market, which this is, a private sale could actually cost you money and cause aggravation. I am not saying that it cannot work, just to be careful.

First, due to the low supply and abundance of qualified buyers, you could undervalue your home. This market is ideal for sellers to leverage offers to drive up the price, but this won’t happen if you deal directly with your neighbor’s friends.

When you put a home on the open market, it goes into the Multiple Listing Service and is seen by thousands of buyers. It also feeds automatically into the listings on realestate.boston.com, Zillow, Trulia, realtor.com, and many other sites. The reach extends worldwide. With a private sale, you reach only one set of buyers who have, frankly, just lucked out. If you don’t put your home on the market, you will never really know its true value.

Think about how much money you could be leaving on the table. We sold a home in Melrose last spring that received multiple offers and commanded $150,000 over the asking price. If our clients had sold privately, they would have left all of this money behind. They would have had no competition, and without an agent, no representation to help them get the best price. If your private buyers are working with an agent, the situation could be even worse; that agent represents them, not you.

Additional considerations:

■ Do your buyers need to sell in order to buy? If the answer is yes, you have another transaction with another set of buyers to be concerned about. Do their buyers also need to sell their home in order to buy?

■ What lender are you working with? Some are good, some are not.

■ Will your home appraise to the purchase price? If it does not, have you included a clause that says it doesn’t need to? If you have that clause, have you checked to make sure that the buyers actually have the funds to bridge any shortfalls?

■ Are your buyers having a home inspection? In a market like this, many waive them. Some buyers will use inspections as opportunities to renegotiate. A good seller’s agent will not allow this to happen to you.

Finally — and don’t underrate this — hiring an agent gives you a buffer. Otherwise, it will just be you and the buyers (or their agents or lawyers). They will call you directly on all things related to their purchase — and they can be very aggressive.

Consider the market before you go down this road. If your neighbor’s friends really are the best buyers, let them make an offer in the open market like everyone else.

Marjorie Youngren is a broker at Century 21 Commonwealth in Lynnfield. E-mail your questions to marjorie.youngren@commonmoves.com. Follow her on Twitter@MarjorieTeamC21.