Your home has languished unsold on the market for months, but you can't fathom why.
Chances are, you've overlooked what buyers really want. Let's take a look in more detail at some of those issues you might have overlooked.
- Your price is too high - This is the number one reason your house isn't selling. Sure, you are attached. Your home is where you raised a family and created memories you can't put a price on.
However, today's buyers are more savvy than partial to your emotions. They either won't look at over-priced properties, or when they do, they'll make a low-ball offer, way below market value.
If your home has been on the market for more than 30 days, it's time to review and adjust your price.
- Your house is poorly located or poorly planned - There's not a lot you can do about this: a small yard, a weird hill that makes mowing maddening, a sink hole down the street, neglect that's turned to blight, a busy road nearby.
No matter how magnificent your home may be on the inside, outside factors can keep buyers from crossing the threshold to take a look. The only way to over come these obstacles is to lower the price until a buyer bites.
- Your advertising is insufficient - Your real estate agent should do more than just list your home with the local multiple listing service (MLS), sit back and wait for agents to beat a path to your door.
When you choose a real estate agent, establish what the agent plans for marketing. What kind of photos will be used? Smartphone photos of your home aren't smart. How will the agent describe your home in the listing? Are open house events and broker tours planned?
These are all important marketing approaches, but if they aren't part of the plan, the lack of them could be a contributing factor to your home's failure to sell.
- You are inflexible - If you are not ready to show your home at a moment's notice, say for a broker's tour, you are a big reason your home won't sell. If you can't show it, you can't sell it. The more buyers who see your home, the faster it sells. The more buyers who see your home, the higher the selling price.
- Too much "you" is in the house - Those snaking handrails and electric blue kitchen you love so dearly, are not going to be big selling points. You want your home staged so that potential buyers can envision it as their home. Neutralize. Don't fill those beautiful, built-in bookcases with family photos and dog figurines. Move personal items out of the house and paint the rooms a neutral color so you allow buyers' imagination to help sell your home by seeing themselves in it.
- Your house looks run down - That big water stain under the deer antler chandelier? Fix the source of the stain and the stain itself. Take down he chandelier. The roof may be new, but potential home buyers will zero in on stains, blemishes and discolorations and believe the cause of the damage remains. Give the carpets a good cleaning too. You don't want to turn off a potential buyer because he or she thinks they will have to repair or replace something.
If you are keep these points in mind and plan accordingly, you should not have to worry about the reasons your house isn't selling
Published: April 18, 2013
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