Optimize Your Sales Price
Optimize Your Sales Price
Doing a lot of work to a car before you trade or sell it to a dealer is not generally a good idea. In most cases, you won’t recapture the cost of the repairs. They can do the repairs for a less than you can. Not to mention, you are selling to a wholesaler who needs to sell it again to the end user and still make a profit.
A home sale is totally different. The owner is selling the home to an end user. Since the buyer, in many cases, is using their available funds for the down payment and purchase costs, they don’t have money to spend on repairs or decorating the home. They would need to live in it “as is” for a while which may not be as appealing as finding a home that is refurbished, up-to-date, and ready to move into.
Even if the buyer would be willing to get a home improvement loan after the sale, it would be a separate loan at a higher interest rate making their payment higher than financing it all in one mortgage at the lower first mortgage rates.
The seller may experience some inconvenience going through the remodeling process, but it will, most likely, result in a higher sales price in less time. Occasionally, sellers say they’ll let the buyer choose their own colors but not all people have the imagination to know what something will look like after it is finished. It is better to go ahead and get the work done before putting it on the market.
The bathrooms and kitchen are the most important rooms to update. If the finish on the cabinets is bad, have them painted. New countertops and appliances can make a world of difference. Paint, countertops, and fixtures in the bath give the home a great feel.
In addition to the repairs, a major cleaning and decluttering can make a home look and feel better than the competition.
The first step is to go through the home and pack up or get rid of things you don’t need or things that detract from the home like excess furniture, exercise equipment, personal artwork, etc. Now, do the same with the closets and cabinets. By getting rid of things, there will be more room and they’ll look larger.
Next, walk across the street from your house and give it a critical look. How is the drive-up appeal? Would you want to go inside to see the rest if you were a buyer? Are the trees and shrubs trimmed? Yard cleaned up? Do you have blooming flowers in the beds? Does the front door and mailbox need a new coat of paint? Do you need to power wash the outside of the home and the sidewalks and driveway? Do the windows need washing?
Buyers are visual people and beauty is always rewarded. Restaurants know that people eat with their eyes first and they go to a lot of effort to plate the food so it is visually appealing. The same approach works for selling a home. Ask your agent if they have ever taken a buyer to a home that refused to go inside because they didn’t like the looks from the street.
Your real estate professional can make specific recommendations and assist you in finding someone to do the work. This is what we do. TRUST US.
If you would like any professional residential Real Estate advice, contact us at Paramount Real Estate Services. 1008 12th St. SE Salem, OR 97302 503-851-1645
Also, to mobilize us right away to help you move, visit us here:
Another Victim. Stop Pricing your Home too High! It is Costing You!
Again, another client suffers from denial and the result is an extra $50,000 out of their pocket. I can’t tell you how many times this happens. Our largest challenge today seems to be educating sellers where the current market value of their home is. A typical listing appointment for us goes like this: We visit the seller’s home to review the location, condition and functionality, and amenities of their home. We spend time analyzing the market to find the REAL MARKET VALUE of their home. After presenting the facts to them, you see a shade of pale come over their face. “No way their home could only be worth that much”, they say. “We want to price it a little high to see if we get any bites. Don’t you want us to get the most out of our house?”
Of course we want our clients to get the most out of their house! That is why we give them the right information at the beginning so they can make an informed decision. Unfortunately often times, they don’t take our advice.
After months and months on the market the sellers usually end up chasing the market as it continues to decline. The most recent experience we had just closed at $50,000 under what they could have sold it for over a year and a half ago when they started the sale process. That denial got the best of them when they decided to price their home at $360,000 instead of the $310,000 that we suggested. They couldn’t stop thinking that their home was much better than the comparable comps around their Creekside neighborhood on Poppy Hills. After 19 months of frustration, they finally cut their losses at $260,000. That is a hard pill to swallow; losing over $50,000! However, that is what commonly happens to sellers who do not price their homes effectively.
Zillow had just released some studies that showed that homeowners who bought their home after 2007 are overpricing their homes 14.1% on average. Homeowners who bought prior to 2007 are overpricing their homes by 10.5% on average. Depending on the price point of the home itself; that can significantly price a seller out of the market! Buyers are finding great deals and those great deals are here to stay. The idea of us bouncing back to healthy appreciation anytime soon is a fallacy. This market is here to stay for quite a while; and by that, I mean quite a few years.
If you are planning on selling, don’t price your home too high! It will cost you!
For a Free Professional Market Analaysis call 503-385-1518 or visit http://www.old.paramountoregon.com