If you’re selling your home on your own, you know that one of the most important factors you can control is setting a competitive price.
It’s tempting to think of pricing your home as the first step in a negotiation, where you price it much higher than what you’re expecting to actually sell it for. While this works for bargaining items at a garage sale, it won’t actually help you attract the most competitive offers.
Buyers make their pricing decision by comparing your property to other properties sold in your area. Even if your property is marketed to everyone in the world, if it is priced too high in comparison to other properties, you will not get the amount of showings you need for competitive offers. And if your property sits on the market for too long it may make it necessary to drop the price below market value to compete with new, well-priced listings.
Pricing your property competitively will generate the most activity from agents and buyers.
The first 30 days on market are critical because a property generates the most interest when it first hits the market. Furthermore, the number of showings is greatest during the first 30 days if it is priced at a realistic market value. Starting too high and dropping the price later misses the excitement and fails to generate strong activity. Many homes that start high end up selling below market value.
So what is the art and science behind pricing? We use as much data as we can to run the numbers for our clients. The hope is to find another property exactly like yours, that sold yesterday, and compare this to the market demand to determine the price.
Not sure what that looks like? Here’s how we do this for other clients:
Of course there is so much more that goes into pricing your home correctly. Blackstone & Co. is happy to help you do this. Just reach out to us on our Contact page!