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Toddlers: 12 - 24 Months
NBR: Frustrated with selling our house
Lately we've been feeling cramped in our little starter home (we've been living here for four years) and that DS doesn't have enough room to play. We decided to start the process of selling our house and then looking for a bigger one. We've been doing a lot to get our house ready to be on the market (painting, purging, etc.) and met with our realtor today to see two houses. Its a little premature because we can't buy until we sell (cannot afford two mortgages at once), but we just wanted to start seeing what's out there.
After we saw the two houses (we really liked the one), we asked our realtor if he had determined what the listing price for our house should be, and he said he was very disheartened when he looked at homes in our area and what they are selling for. Then, he started to talk about all the negative points of our house. Our house is less square feet than a lot of the homes in our neighborhood (but I think ours is one of the nicer looking on the outside). Our windows are an old style and we have redwood siding instead of regular vinyl siding. But, its a starter home, so its not perfect. I remember back to when we were looking at this house when we were looking to stop renting, and we thought it was a cute little starter home. I can't imagine there's no one looking for a starter home that would think the same thing.
Part of me thinks we need a new realtor. I feel like maybe our realtor is used to bigger sales, and this may be too small for him. I feel like even if there are improvements that could be made, a realtor's job is to market a house. Our sitter is selling her house and its nothing fancy. But the next day her realtor had a cute little brochure made up, etc. He gave no positives about our house, and we don't live in a dump or anything. It's just a cute little starter home. It's not cost effective to look into new windows, siding, etc. because we once looked into it and it was SUPER expensive. With the home prices in our neighborhood, we would never make that money back in the sale of our house. We also talked about trying to do a for sale by owner.
Not to mention the market stinks. Our realtor said sellers are now paying a ton of closing costs for the buyer, as much as $7,000 in our area!
We were really hoping to be in a bigger house by spring/summer, but its just not looking good at this point, and I'm so frustrated. Ugh! Thanks for letting me vent.
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Re: NBR: Frustrated with selling our house
You don't want someone who just tells you what you want to hear- you want someone who can sell your house. I do think it is important for you to feel comfortable with your relator, but I don't think you should discount everything you were told just because it wasn't what you wanted to hear.
Please don't try a FSBO in this market and especially if you want to be out this spring or summer.
This is coming from the wife of a relator and developer. Yes, I am biased, but I also know what I am talking about.
You def want a realtor that you like and feel comfortable with. You will be seeing a lot of him/her over the next few months. You also want a realtor who can tactfully point out the negatives of your home while also playing up the selling points. Also, a lot of the 'big time' realtors want to underprice houses so that they can move them quickly. Listing your house for $10,000 less only means a very small difference in what they pocket and they would rather move houses quickly. (Read Freakenomics sometime, lots of good examples of this and the like). Don't be afraid to speak up if you have done your research and you think your realtor wants to underprice your home.
We are in PA and have sold 2 houses in the last 3 years so I have a little experience in this area.
The closing cost part is entirely true though. Although if you are in a starter home you probably won't have to pay anywhere near $7,000 in closing costs for your buyer. And on the plus side you can also expect your seller to pay part of yours, so it kind of evens out.
Thanks for replying. I totally get what you're saying. We aren't discounting anything he said. No, it wasn't what we expected or wanted to hear, but we also don't want him to sugarcoat things for us. We were just expecting to be told a listing price to start our house at, and instead got all of these reasons why he feels disheartened about our house selling.
I think you should totally find someone else- you need someone who is EXCITED about selling your house. He is your employee and you are paying for his services. That is not what I was trying to say- I just think you should keep all the other guys suggestions in the back of your mind.
Exactly! I just felt like it was all about the things that aren't good selling points (less square footage than other homes in the area, older windows, shingles instead of vinyl siding), and he mentioned absolutely no positives. After he talked about all the negatives, he showed us a bunch of listings in our neighborhood where 1) they were/have been on the market for at least six months - a year and 2) where the buyer paid $4-$7K in closing costs. I know its not a huge house and there are improvements that could be made, but after hearing all of the negatives and how disheartened he was (his words), we left feeling completely hopeless with selling our house.
As I said, we didn't expect him to sugarcoat things, but we think its a cute little starter home and would be a nice starter home for someone else.
I agree....keep looking!
And honestly, a lot of it can be luck. The house we just sold in Oct, the buyers had been looking for a house like ours in their price range for 6+ months. They drove by and looked at it the day our house hit the MLS and made an offer on it the next day. And you never really know if you'll be lucky if you don't try!
Thanks! This guy is a good realtor (and a good guy in general). He goes to my parent's church, has been in the business for a long time and won a ton of awards. I just think he's used to bigger sales and not small starter houses.
Well the comps in your area have A LOT to do with what yours will sell for so you need to focus on other things in order to get people in to see it. We are selling our home too, its a short sale, so I have to do that much more to get people in to look and get past getting the tax credit. We are also at a disadvantage because they are still building out our neighborhood and the market has caused the brand new houses being built (the same ones as mine by the same builder) to drop significantly. So now I am competing with brand new homes. So I looked into how to stage a home, I highlight all the great things about my home and try to minimize the negative ones. My home has a big kitchen with a large island so I do what I can to put a focus on that when it is shown. And I make my home smell great when potential buyers some thru. I burn vanilla cupcake/cinnamon bun candles so it smells like I have been baking all day. Every realtor thru our house has said that it shows fantastically and smells amazing. We havent had an offer yet and I know its because of our SS but I keep working at it.
Ask your realtor to do flyers, make a flyer yourself to highlight things about your home, the neighborhood that you love. It takes some work and in your case, if you want to be out soon, a little more on your part to help get it sold. Good luck!