Pricing Your Home for Sale

If you are selling your home, you want the best possible price and terms. Several factors will determine how much you will sell your home for. The idea is to get the maximum price and the best terms during the window of time when your home is being marketed. My goal is to get you where you need to be ON TIME!

There are several ways to gather information about the value of your home. The most effective way to do this is for us to talk about your property. I will prepare a comparable market analysis showing the prices of recently sold homes that are comparable to yours and the prices of comparable homes on the market.

All real estate transactions are different, and because of this you should do as much as you can to prepare your home for sale, I am here to assist you with the process.

In considering home values, several factors come into play:

The value of your home relates to local sales prices. The same home located elsewhere would likely have a different value.

Sales price is a product of supply and demand. If you live in a community with an expanding job base, a growing population, and a limited housing supply, prices will likely rise. If the local community is losing jobs and people are moving out, then prices will likely drop or stay the same. The personal situation of the seller is also a factor. If you need to move quickly, you will have less leverage in the marketplace. If you have no incentive to sell quickly, you may have more leverage.

Sales price is not based on how much money you need to purchase your next home.

I pride myself in keeping a close eye on the market. Statistics are gathered and analyzed on a regular basis. I can tell you how long it is taking to sell properties in your price range. You will receive information about the market conditions and additional information about how the location of your property, condition, and other pertinent factors will affect the price of your home. Based on that information, you will be able to make an educated decision about pricing your home.

Why overpricing a home is risky

Some sellers want to list their home at an inflated value, believing that they can always lower the price down the road if needed. But this can be a risky strategy. New listings generally get the greatest exposure in the first two-to-four weeks on the market, so setting a realistic price from day one is critical. If a home is priced too high, your strongest pool of prospective buyers is eliminated because they think it’s out of their price range.  Conversely, buyers who can afford it will compare it to other homes that have been fairly priced and decide that they can get more home for their money elsewhere.

Once it has been decided to reduce the price, you’ve unnecessarily lost time and money. Your strongest prospective buyers may have found another home, while the over-inflated price could result in a negative impression amongst agents and buyers who are still in the market. Not to mention, reengaging buyers after those first critical few weeks can be very challenging. As the saying goes, “time is money”; so the longer a home is on the market, the lower the selling price will likely be in relation to the initial listing price.

Setting a home price too high has other costs

When a home languishes on the market, the seller loses in a number of ways. Each month the home goes unsold is another month of costs to the owner in mortgage payments, taxes, and maintenance—expenses that are not recovered when the home is sold. Furthermore, until the house is sold, the owner is on hold and can’t move forward with whatever plans prompted the decision to sell. If the seller is still living in the home, it can also be fatiguing to keep the property in ready-to-show condition month after month.