There are many elements to consider when selling a home, and all of them are important. As a realtor I have represented many sellers and have had conversations with many more. Every seller that I have ever come in contact with has had an opinion about what is important when it comes to selling a home. If you ask they will give you an endless list of features or attributes. Some will even mention marketing methods and essential services preformed by realtors. I have been told about: location, view, style, condition, landscaping, the proximity to shopping, schools, church. The list is truly endless; and guess what, they are all correct.
Any positive attribute will enhance the owner's enjoyment of the property and in some manner will help the salability of the property. On the humorous side I have noticed that every seller points out something their home has as the important reason prospects may turn in to buyers. But hey, that is just human nature.
I promised in the title of this article to share with you the biggest mistake sellers make and I am going to do that by telling a short story. Yesterday I was in the produce section of a super-store and it occurred to me that I needed some tomatoes. There were five or six different types to choose from, maybe more. I glanced over all of the tomatoes first, and then looked up at the prices on the cards located above eyelevel. The process went like this, looked at price then tomato, price – tomato. Not being a tomato connoisseur may have actually complicated my selection process, slightly. Someone with a more refined palate may not have quibbled over half-a-buck for the best specimen.
Okay, I admit it, price was a factor. I didn't go for the cheapest, nor the most expensive (absurdly expensive) but rather for the ones in the middle price range. After choosing the type, the real buyer in me came out. There must have been two or three hundred tomatoes on that table of the kind I selected as being in the right appearance/value combination. After the field is narrowed down to a specific type, what do you do? I picked out the ones that looked the best to me.
Is buying a home more complicated? Oh yeah, a million times more complicated. I have never seen anyone break out in a sweat over buying tomatoes. But the point of my shopping story is to identify the mental process a buyer goes through when they buy anything, even a home. And this is the tripping point for most sellers, supply and demand. A bunch of tomatoes to choose from, I needed three, took home the three that looked best when compared to the ones left behind. Buying a home is much more complex, but it is exactly the same process.
So what is the number one mistake sellers make? They/we/everyone believes there is something other than the tomato buying process that sets the value of the home when it comes time to sell. Wrong! The value is equal to what the seller will accept and what the buyer will give, assuming neither is forced to act. I can not tell you how many times I have heard a seller state they need x dollars out of the home they are selling in order to buy their next home. There is absolutely no connection in that statement to the reality of what a buyer is willing to give for an existing home. Really, do you think a buyer will pay $50,000 above market for a home simply because the sellers need it for their next purchase? Perhaps that is true in some markets, not in mine.
It is hard enough to sell a home when it is priced right in my market, much less if it is overpriced. Don't get me wrong, it is not a bad market, but in an area with a million plus people, there are a lot of tomatoes to choose from.
Everyone has heard about staging, and other tips for getting a home ready to show. The reason those things are important when you sell is because of what I am talking about. Buyers are going to compare your home to other homes in the area. What you paid for the home or what you need to buy the next home isn't even on the buyer's list. It doesn't matter if you built the home and used the heavy duty nails. What matters is what else can the buyer purchase for the same or less money down the street.
There is a very easy way to avoid making this mistake. If you are considering making a move, shop for a clone of your own home first, long before looking at homes to buy. Find out what other sellers are asking for homes similar to yours. The easiest and honest way to accomplish this is to attend as many open house events as possible. You will not be deceiving anyone if you simply tell them you are looking around. Take careful notes, take pictures and keep a file of counter top flyers from every home because they will typically describe each house in great detail. Here is another important thing to do, keep a list of what you notice sellers and or realtors doing wrong when trying to sell a home. This will give you a great list of things not to do.
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