By Ellen James Martin
the Pueblo Chieftan
Like the U.S. economy as a whole, the real estate market is supposed to be recovering. And many neighborhoods now are experiencing a shortage of available homes. So it’s doubly exasperating if your home is the outlier that languishes unsold for a lengthy period of time.
Perhaps your place is crying out for cosmetic improvements you’ve failed to do for cost reasons. Or maybe your price is just too high for the local market.
Perhaps your neighborhood market has cooled lately and your only option is to adapt, says Sid Davis, a real estate broker and author of A Survival Guide for Selling a Home.
Jeff Drerup, a mortgage lender who’s worked in the field since 1979, says tighter controls over the lending industry have made it harder and more time-consuming for borrowers to get their loans through, which in turn has hurt home sales.
Whatever the explanation for an unsold home, Davis says those who want or need to sell generally can meet with success if they’re strategic in their focus. Here are a few pointers for frustrated home sellers:
Learn about your neighborhood market
When assessing the situation related to your unsold home, Davis recommends you first gather data about your neighborhood. Ask your listing agent for a set of statistics known as “average days on market.” These data reflect the time it takes for a typical house to go from list to sale. Notice whether this average time span is narrowing (which indicates a warming market) or widening (cooling market).
If you determine your neighborhood is cooling and note that your place has remained unsold for fewer days than the average selling time, Davis counsels patience. But if you’re already over the typical norm, you probably have two options: improve the look and condition of your home or reduce the asking price.
Review home’s condition before cutting price
Davis suggests cutting your home’s listing price should happen only after you’ve gone over steps you could take to make the property look fresher and more appealing.
“Homes that radiate a superior pride of ownership are much rarer than you imagine. If you can get your place in tip-top condition, with a superior paint job and sparkling clean windows, you’ll make selling much easier,” he says.
Sometimes minor issues can seriously hinder a potential sale. For example, don’t make the mistake of thinking buyers will overlook a little messiness, like dishes in the sink, piles of unsorted mail or an unkempt home office.
“Some people won’t even spend five minutes in a cluttered or dusty house, let alone put an offer on it,” Davis says.
He recommends that, if necessary, you hire a professional organizer and a cleaning service. Also, your odds of selling could improve substantially with a few relatively small expenditures in your bathrooms and kitchen and fresh paint throughout your place, he says.
Avoid annoying your listing agent
As Davis says, it’s good for would-be sellers to receive feedback from buyers who visit their home. Such feedback can help you make midcourse corrections. For example, if visitors say the presence of your dog is off-putting, you’ll want to put the pet elsewhere when visitors next come through.
Customarily, visitor feedback reaches home sellers through their listing agent. And your agent should contact you on a routine basis. During your listing period, such contacts should occur every few days, if not once a day.
But when sellers become frustrated, Davis says some begin projecting their frustration onto their listing agent.
“Pestering your agent is totally counterproductive to your best interests,” he says.
Davis encourages discouraged home sellers to request a “sit down” with their listing agent to brainstorm ways to gain momentum.
“The agent has the same goal as you – to get your property sold as quickly as possible and for the highest possible price. So instead of becoming an irritant to the agent, aim to work as a team,” Davis says.
Ellen James Martin writes for The Pueblo Chieftan and can be reached by email at ellenjamesmartin@gmail.com.
