| Greed: This one is a biggie. It was easy in a seller's | | | | to the comparable pricing data your agent provided |
| market to get in touch with your greedy side. Feeling | | | | you? Or did you have a set price in your mind and |
| like Midas, anything you asked for from a buyer turned | | | | refused to move from it when listing the home? The |
| to gold in your hands. Drunk with that kind of power, | | | | impatient seller can create an enormous amount of |
| buyers were often left feeling helpless to comply if | | | | stress for everyone involved in selling the home, and |
| they wanted your home. In a balanced market, or | | | | it's totally avoidable. In the end, the timing of the sale of |
| even in a buyer's market, many sellers have not kicked | | | | your home will be a combination of price, condition, and |
| the greed habit. Ironically, greed is costing those sellers | | | | luck. No amount of impatience is going to change that. |
| money. Ask any real estate agent and they will tell you | | | | Ignoring the market: Ignorance is not bliss. Ignorance is |
| stories of deals that were blown because of a | | | | disaster for a home seller. Yes, we know that your |
| $300.00 item that could not be agreed upon. No longer | | | | neighbor sold their home for the same price you want |
| with the advantage, many sellers are refusing to make | | | | for your home, but that was four months ago. The |
| any concessions if it means less money in their | | | | residential real estate market is more fluid than ever |
| pockets, but now the buyer's are free to move along | | | | now. Educate yourself about current market conditions, |
| to the next house on their list. A seller may balk at | | | | not last year's market, not even last month's market. A |
| fixing a $500.00 item in the house, or providing an | | | | home seller who ignores the market will interview a |
| inexpensive home warranty, but when the buyer | | | | few real estate agents, read the data provided by the |
| moves along to an accommodating seller, the greedy | | | | agent, then ignore the data and list with the agent that |
| seller is left to wait for another buyer - all the while | | | | gives them the least argument about pricing their home |
| making mortgage payments on the house they can't | | | | unrealistically. Real estate agents do not price homes, |
| sell. Bad move. | | | | sellers do. The agents will provide valuable information |
| Unrealistic Expectations: Anyone who has sold a home | | | | and input to help a seller choose a price. Some agents |
| in a seller's market is going to have a hard time | | | | will refuse to take a listing if they feel the seller is |
| grasping a buyer's market. If you want to sell your | | | | unrealistic about pricing, but many others will take the |
| house, you have to forget everything you remember | | | | listing with the caveat that the seller be open to |
| about selling your house in the past. Odds are that | | | | reducing the price later. With so many other properties |
| your home will not sell in a week, nor will you receive | | | | on the market, an overpriced home will sit there like a |
| multiple offers. Unrealistic expectations are the | | | | deli tray at a gathering of vegetarians. Then, the seller |
| foundation of blame and resentment, and they keep | | | | will be chasing the market by lowering the price after |
| you from selling your home. The first few weeks of | | | | watching the prices around them fall. Eventually, the |
| having your home on the market is filled with hope, | | | | house may sell, but the price will be determined by the |
| anxiety, and irrational exuberance. It's completely | | | | market, as it always is. If you are guilty of ignoring the |
| normal to believe that your home is somehow more | | | | market, you can save yourself a lot of time and |
| special than the others on the market, and yours will | | | | headache by scheduling a meeting with your real |
| be the exception to the tough market. Once it | | | | estate agent to go over the current sales data for |
| becomes clear that the bidding war has not | | | | your home, and setting a realistic price, now. |
| materialized, and your home still sits along with the | | | | Stubbornness: When selling your home it's best to |
| others, a home seller with unrealistic expectations is | | | | imagine yourself as a supple tree gently swaying with |
| crushed. Stay positive about your home, but don't blind | | | | the wind, instead of a donkey with its heels dug solidly |
| yourself to what selling it will entail. A home seller with | | | | into the dirt resisting all attempts to be budged. |
| a realistic view of what it takes to sell a house in a | | | | Stubbornness can show up in many situations. When |
| balanced or buyer's market, can easily adapt to | | | | you are contacted to schedule a showing, do you |
| changing market conditions, use constructive feedback | | | | leave the house? Though it's a fact that your home |
| to improve their home, and in return sell their home | | | | has a better chance of selling if you are not there for |
| faster. | | | | the showing, do you refuse to be inconvenienced by |
| Pride: If you really want to sell your home, make the | | | | having to leave? You may tell yourself that the buyers |
| promise right now that you will never utter the | | | | can work around your schedule. They won't. The |
| following phrase: "I'm going to send that buyer a | | | | chance for a sale often vanishes because a buyer |
| message." If you enjoy sending messages, then | | | | feels uncomfortable with the homeowner in the house, |
| perhaps you could raise carrier pigeons. If you want to | | | | and cannot freely assess the house. Expect to be |
| sell your home, drop that phrase from your vocabulary. | | | | inconvenienced when you sell your home. It's part of |
| The message that sellers send, when they respond to | | | | the process. |
| buyers that way is "I don't want to sell my house to | | | | Being Uncooperative: Are you a partner with your real |
| you. You have insulted me." In the end, all you are left | | | | estate agent when it comes to getting your home |
| with is your pride, and that house that just will not sell. | | | | sold? Do you resist all suggestions by your real estate |
| As an active Ebayer, I have never witnessed a | | | | agent to make changes to your home that will help it |
| transaction in which the seller of an item got indignant | | | | sell faster? I've had this conversation with home sellers |
| at the lowest bidder. It's all business. Divorce your | | | | many times. Is it fair that people judge your home |
| emotions from the home selling process, and you have | | | | based on the things that are not going to be in it when |
| an advantage over the angry sellers in your area, | | | | you move out? No, probably not. Do buyers judge |
| because the buyers that they turn way with their | | | | your home based on those things? Absolutely. I've |
| "messages", are going to buy a home - just not theirs! | | | | seen buyers lose their enthusiasm for a home based |
| The message to send to a buyer should be in the | | | | on a decorating theme that didn't suit them. No matter |
| form of a counter-offer. Nothing more. Nothing less. | | | | how many times their real estate agent might remind |
| Impatience: You want this home sold. Now! The | | | | them that they can decorate in their own style, it's too |
| impatient seller can't understand why their home hasn't | | | | late. The home is now referred to as the "duck home", |
| sold in the first week. By the third week on the market, | | | | or the "doll home", or the "pink home." Every house |
| the impatient home seller is fuming, and wondering how | | | | gets a nickname when buyers are shopping. Don't let |
| to get out of the listing agreement. Are you an | | | | your refusal to cooperate stop your home from being |
| impatient home seller? If you've chosen your real | | | | the "perfect home." |
| estate agent carefully, and believed when you signed | | | | The sale of your home requires the cooperation of |
| the listing agreement that they are up to the job, then | | | | countless people, many of whom you'll never meet. |
| sit back and let the market work. The impatient seller | | | | The key word here is "cooperation." We, as home |
| calls their agent more than once a day for updates, | | | | sellers, expect those that are working to complete our |
| even if there has been no activity on the house. The | | | | sales transaction to be cooperative. What about you, |
| question, "why isn't it selling?" is regularly pleaded over | | | | the home seller? Are you willing to meet the buyer |
| the phone. Are you, the impatient seller, doing | | | | halfway in negations? Are you willing to work within |
| everything you need to do to get your home sold? | | | | someone else's schedule to get something signed? |
| Have you done the things your agent suggested to | | | | Remember, you may be selling a property, but in the |
| get your home in selling condition? Did you really listen | | | | end, real estate is about humans. Be a good one. |