Everyone has seen it. A house languishes on the market month after month. Why isn’t the house selling? Sellers have a thousand excuses, but at the end of the day there are only three reasons a home does not sell:
1. It’s priced too high
2. It’s not properly marketed
3. It’s hard to show
That’s it. There are no other reasons.
Pricing:
The marketplace knows what homes are worth. Anyone with an Internet connection can find out what homes are selling for now and what they’ve sold for in the past. When buyers see a home they will decide what to pay based on what other homes that are similar have sold for. If a particular home is priced outside of the right range, buyers simply won’t buy the home.
What are the telltale signs the home is overpriced? When the feedback includes:
1. It’s too small – That means the buyers expect a bigger home for the price.
2. It’s on a busy street – For the price the buyers expect the house to be quieter
3. The rooms are too small – Other houses in the price range have bigger rooms
4. The house is a mess – if it were priced low enough the condition would not matter
5. The home has been on the market for a long time – The price is too high.
But pricing isn’t everything.
Marketing:
Let’s pretend for a moment that you are a seller who is willing to give away your home for free to anyone who brings an offer; but you never tell a soul that you’re willing to sell. How long will it take to sell your home? The answer is “forever” because nobody knows it’s for sale. You can’t sell something unless buyers know it’s for sale!
If the home is not properly marketed it does not matter how well priced the home is. Sometimes a property can be entered in the multiple listing service (MLS) and still be badly marketed. How is that possible? Because the listing agent does not fill out information about a home completely. For example, a listing agent may have a 3,000 square foot home but does not fill in the square footage for a home. The MLS shows the home as being ZERO square feet. When a buyer looks online and enters “Find homes over 2,000 square feet” the MLS will not find the home that has “0” square feet! Thus, the home is hiding in plain sight.
But marketing isn’t everything either!
If you have a house that is overpriced it does not matter how much marketing you do. Let’s pretend you are a seller who is selling a house for one-billion dollars. It wouldn’t matter if your agent gave the world’s best individualized presentation to every human on the planet, the house would not sell because the price is too high.
Access:
You can’t sell what you can’t see. When owners don’t allow easy access the home won’t sell. Ideally, the home should be available 24-hours a day, seven days a week on a lockbox without an appointment required. The more restrictions on easy showings the harder it is to sell. You’d be amazed at how many houses require appointments to be seen, or require the listing agent to be present for showings, or only allow showings at inconvenient times. All of these are obstacles to the sale of the home.
Whose Fault Is It?
When a home is not to selling the seller naturally wants to know why that’s happening. The answer is simple, it’s either the agent’s fault or the sellers fault. That’s because the agent is responsible for marketing the home. The seller is responsible for the price and access.
As a seller you must determine if the house is being properly marketed. Frequently, when a home fails to sell, it’s because the agent is working for such a low commission that he/she doesn’t have enough money to properly market the home. Even if the agent has the money, the question is whether the right marketing is being done. If not, find an agent who can properly market the house.
If the marketing is being done well and the home isn’t selling, make it easier to show.
If the home is properly marketed and easy to show, but has not sold:
Lower the Price!