I need some real estate advice (kind of long)

LauraMax

LauraMax

Cathlete
I am so frustrated! I've had my house on the market for going on 4 months now. I've had one single, lonely lowball offer at 20% below the listing price.

Here are some facts: it's a 2 BR, 1 bath house built in 1870.

The positives: my house is literally about 50 feet from the midtown direct train station (takes you right into Penn Station) so is great for commuters (no, the train isn't loud if you're wondering, they're electric & you barely notice them). It's also in the downtown so is kind of a cool urban setting in the suburbs--pedestrian access to restaurants, shops, movie theater, etc. After trying to sell it last year with absolutely no takers, I put about $20K of renovations into it, including knocking out a wall & putting in a breakfast bar, new hardwood floors on 2nd floor (first floor was already done), new interior lighting (chandelier in DR, flush mount in LR--VERY expensive, upscale stuff), California walk-in closet, new privacy fencing around a pretty large (about 30 X 120) backyard, & various other items like copper ($30 a piece!), tin & nickel switchplates/outlet covers, had the entire interior re-painted, the house had a brand new kitchen & bath the year before I moved in, & of course the place is immaculate.

Most importantly, it's one of 4 properties in the entire town between the $300K-$350K price range. The other places are total crap that I wouldn't let my dog use as his backyard, if you get my drift.

The negatives: it's small (but I've had singles & young couple commuters looking at it), & there's no driveway (there's parking in a lot about 50 feet from my front door).

So, while other 2 BR houses in other neighborhoods are selling w/in a week above asking price (one listed at $425K on a Tuesday & sold at $500K by Friday) I can't get a single reasonable offer on mine.

I've had 4 open houses. Not a soul came to the most recent. There's another scheduled for this Sunday & I swear it's my last. I'm so tired of being exiled from my house one of my two free days a week. Also we've dropped the price twice so far.

I'm really miserable there. Too much hustle & bustle, too urban for my taste. I want to live on a nice, quiet street & I want to have some workout space. I'm just at a loss. Can anyone give me some advice on how to unload this place?

I'm thinking if nothing happens this Sunday I'm gonna just drop it to rock bottom, dump it & rent somewhere (b/c at rock bottom I won't have 20% to put down on something else). But I really hate the idea of renting at my age. For some reason it strikes me as too immature. A woman my age should own her own home. :-(

The sad thing is, given the history & condition of the house, not to mention all the improvements I did which at this point seem to be an utter waste of time & money, I feel like it's already underpriced.
 
Are you working with a realtor, or are you trying to sell it yourself? It sounds like perhaps you just aren't getting enough people by to look at it, if other similar properties are selling for much more. People are often leery of buying FSBO's, if that's what you are doing.

If you ARE going through a realtor, what is their take on what's going on? They should really understand the market enough to be able to help you out here. And if not, I'd say it's time to find a new realtor.

m.
 
Hi Laura,

Have you thought of changing real estate agents? Maybe get the one who's sold the other homes in your neighborhood.

I have an aunt and uncle who were recently having trouble selling their home. I think it was on the market for a year. Turns out they listed with an agent who really specializes in a higher end market than there home was, so their house wasn't getting promoted to the right potential buyers. They switched agents and got a good offer within weeks.

HTH
 
Hi Laura,

Sorry your home selling experience is so frustrating for you!

It's hard to say why your house is not selling, without knowing your market and your house.

I do have a couple of questions though. You said that some singles and young couple commuters were looking at it. Do you know what the feedback from them was? Meaning, did your agent talk to the buyer's agent what the potential buyer liked and disliked about the house, if they bought another house, if they bought another house, what made them chose that house over yours. Or why the buyer decided not to make an offer on your house.

I find that feedback from other agents is a tremendous help for figuring out what the problem is and why it is not selling. I usually ask them, what they think should have been done to make the house more appealing to their client or potential home buyers in general. I ask them, if a different price would have made a difference for their client or where the agent thinks it should be priced at for it to sell.

Whereas I never make my decisions and recommendations dependent on what ONE particular agent or potential buyer says, I do look for a common thread and I do have to read between the lines sometimes.

In my experience only three things sell a house, location, condition and price. You can't do much about the location, it is what it is, if it is a less desireable location it usually has to be reflected in the price. If the condition leaves a lot to be desired it will be reflected in the price. Meaning, there is nothing that the right price can't overcome. But you need to know what the potential buyers and their agents feedback was, so you know what you need to adjust.

The other thing that comes to my mind, did you have a professional home stager in to prepare your home for sale?? Whereas I can tell from the pictures on your picture trail, it is very nice and clean, you live in homes differently than you sell it.

Meaning, you have to "de-personalize" your house, so potential buyers can see themselves and their stuff in the house. If you have to many personal things (pictures, religious stuff, particular lifestyle things, etc.) around people have a hard time emotionally connecting to the house.

Buying a house is very emotional, and in general people fall in love with a house and then try to justify their emotional decision with a logical run-down, i.e. price, upgrades, comparables, etc.

For the past 4 years, I have employed the services of a professional home stager on almost every single listing I have with tremendous success! I think it is the single best marketing investment I can make for my client (I usually pick up the tab for the consultation - costs me about about $ 200 to 750, depending on size of the house) and boy, it is soooo worth it!!! At a maximum it is the cost of sending out 1,000 postcards announcing the sale of the house or 2 ads in the paper. And the staging is by far more effective, sending out postcards it's hit or miss, staging improves the marketability and the appeal immediately and is targeted to SERIOUS buyers.

I have a few examples where my Sellers originally either didn't want to make the time to meet with the home stager or didn't listen to her advise, stayed on the market for months and eventually staged the home and it sold within a couple of days or weeks after they got done.

In one instance, we even raised the price (and no, that was not in the crazy market 2 years ago, it was just recently)after the staging and it sold 5 days after the staging project was completed.

Hope this helps, you have my email address, feel free to email me directly, if you have any questions that you don't want to post here. Otherwise, you know I am usually on the forum on a daily basis ;-)

Take care,

Carola

ETA: Open houses are a waste of time in my experience. The odds of a QUALIFIED buyer stopping by at the time of open house, finding it's in their price range and falling in love with that house are very, very slim.
 
OK, lots of good advice here, let me see if I can address the questions & get your feedback.

I put a FSBO sign in my yard in January, after which I was contact by every realtor in the tri-state area. :p Because of the large volume of foot traffic I get from the train station I simply could not handle the volume of calls so I did list w/a realtor. Actually realtorS--they're a married couple who work together. The reason I chose them was b/c 1) I instinctually trusted them and 2) they seemed to really love my house. After 4 months I cannot say enough good things about them. My house is small potatoes compared to most of the RE in the area, & they have really busted their butts trying to sell it.

I have had a TON of people come & look. I consistently get two comments, either separately or together: it's too small and/or there's no driveway.

Some of the open houses have actually gone pretty well b/c there are a slew of condos about a block away. They're all about the same size as my house but priced at at least $80K more. Add the $350 per month association fee (my house comes w/a home warranty w/a first class upgrade that includes window a/c, all appliances, plumbing, etc.), plus the taxes are $10K compared to my $5K, so you're looking at about a difference of about $1000 in monthly payments. In my mind it's a no brainer. In any case, we've found that when we have an open house on a day the condos DO NOT have an open house, we get no foot traffic at all. Zero.

Carola, to answer your 3 questions:

Location: depends on if you're a commuter or not, & if you want to live in an urban or suburban area. If you're a commuter or young & want to live in the center of town, it's the best spot in town. If not, it's not a great location.

Price: definitely priced in the right range. My realtors priced it at $370K & thought it would go over asking price. We've since dropped it $20K. But based on everything else I've seen out there in similar or even worse condition, it's underpriced.

Condition: it's perfect. As my realtors are fond of saying, you could pack your suitcases & move right in. EVERYTHING has been upgraded. As I'm fond of saying, it's like living in an historic home & new construction at the same time.

I've kind of tried to stage the home myself (yeah I watch a lot of TLC & HGTV). My problem is I have very limited space--probably about 800 sq ft of actual living space (the attic is extremely clean, floored & well organized, the basement is empty, clean & dry). Other than actually removing furniture & storing it somewhere, do you think I should take down my photos & stuff? (everything except Cosmo's picture of course) Should I move some of the workout stuff I have in a corner out into the porch? Maybe that would help? Doesn't seem to make sense to pay someone to come in when there's really not much that can be done in such a small space. However I'll mention it to my realtor & see what she thinks.

Thanks again for the advice--there are a couple of places out there I want to buy & I'm afraid I'm gonna lose them. Plus I am just DESPERATE to get out of there!
 
For what it is worth - I am in my 11th home - ugh - but hey, I've been in the latest more than 8 years now!! Anyway, I wanted to weigh in as a many-time-buyer in all types of markets and locations. I have learned to always come in 20% below - especially if I think a seller has had the home on the market a while. Unfortunately, your home is only worth what someone else is willing to pay. Taking less is not a failure if it helps you get to the next step. At this point the value you have placed on the property is only 'theoretical' equity. I now this is not a popular position, and your realtors would argue with me, I am sure. I did sell real estate for a year or so back in the 90s - when California was in one of its not too typical slumps. Lots of adjustments on price and values during that time. If I were your realtor, I would encourage flexibility.
 
Sheesh, I wished Carol lived near me! I will be selling my house in the next few years and I don't want to be in the position of having it sit on the market too long.

Anyway, Laura, my only thought is that if the buyers think it is too small, is it because you have too much furniture in there? Can you put some stuff in storage and pare it down to the bare minimum? Also, what are your paint colors? Are they darker? Are your linens light colored? Dark paint and fabrics do make spaces seem smaller. You need to trick people into thinking it's larger than it is!

Also, if you have a large backyard, is there any way you can do parking access back there? (No idea how your setup is, but that would solve the problem. Most urban people would probably be looking more for parking/convenience than a yard, I would think.)

Good luck. I'm so sorry you're having such a hard time!

Marie

PS: After that length of time, I'd definitely bring in a stager. What's going to happen now is, because you've been on the market for so long, people are going to start thinking there's a reason for that. So you need to do what you can asap.
 
Also, and don't get mad, are there any animal smells? Sometimes the least little odor could bother some people. (not that it mattered to my husband and me when we bought ours. But it did take YEARS to get the smell out...long story, won't bother you with it now.)

Good luck!
 
I hear your frustration, Laura.

Let me address one thing at the very beginning, I think it is VERY important that you get a home stager in, ESPECIALLY in a small home. There is a lot a good home stager can do to make the home look bigger and more appealing to the broader masses, and therefore, possibly overcome the lacking parking space (which I believe could be an issue) so you can actually sell it at a good price and in a reasonable time frame. I think the few hundred $$ a good home stager will cost are money well spent. Sure beats dropping the price to rock bottom.

I have to admit that like you I am watching the "Designed to Sell" and other shows on TLC and HGTV about home staging AND I have been working with my home stager for many years, so one would think that by now I could do it myself and not spend the money on her. But NOOOOO.....
I think I have a good understanding of things that are important (like taking down pictures and personal stuff) but I am not creative enough to get the house to, how my home stager puts it, "tell a story". I am always amazed what she can do with even small spaces, they look bigger, more inviting and there is not a single house that she has staged that didn't sell in less than 2 months, even in this market. That really is why I keep spending the money on her, I really don't want to blow several hundred $$ either.

I think you mentioned in a previous post that you put all your money in the inside of the home and your backyard and didn't think the curb appeal is that crucial. I have found that the curb appeal is extremely important and it is where you can lose a potential buyer before they even enter the house.

You mentioned in your post that you hired your agents because they really seem to love your house, I am kind of hesitant to say that and I don't want to sound like a party pooper but it's not always the best choice to hire the agent who loves your house. I usually have a much harder time selling a house that I really love opposed to a house that I find flat out ugly or only find so-so.

Why? Because on the house that I love, I tend to have a bigger emotional attachment and the issues that are really there, may not register with me right away. I am not saying your agents can't sell it, I am just saying sometimes as an agent when you really like a house you are biased and may not see what other agents see. Does that make sense?

I understand that your agents priced it at $ 370k thinking it would go over asking price. I have had that happen to me too, thinking I am priced sooo well and it will sell in no time and at least at asking price. Nope! Then I had other houses listed for sale that in my opinion where WAY too high and were real dog houses and they went in a few days or week, leaving me in a state of disbelieve.

My advise, talk to your agents to give you an honest opinion of what you can realistically expect and what they would advise to do. As an agent, it is one of the conversations that I dread like nothing else. Nothing else is worse than to say something that your client won't be happy with (I am not saying this is what will happen with your agents).

Be aware though, and please don't take this the wrong way, just because your agents will be telling you what you want to hear, it may not be in your best interest. Just ask them to please be brutally honest and give you their advise even you won't like what they have to say.

For whatever reason the $ 370k or even $ 350k is not getting you an offer, it sounds like it is priced right, otherwise you wouldn't get so many potential buyers in. I say, get a home stager!!!!

I hope you don't take what I said as an insult, I just want to throw out a few possibilities what could be an issue and/or a solution to your challenge. However, I don't know your market, I don't know your house and I don't know your agents.

Take care,

Carola
 
Hi Laura,

I just sold my house in 3 days for way over asking. My realator is amazing at marketing. He mails out color listings of the house with all the details and pictures. Also the open house we had he offered fresh juices and food. He had me put fresh flowers in all the rooms and clear out and personal items. I am a serious minimalist and he said that is the best way to show a house. I was getting offers before the official offer day and our price was agressive and still went over. Are you marketing your house well... listing all the wonderful details and the great commuting acsess. Have you listed all the upgrades that you have done? The bennefite of the area. Is there web acsess with photos?

Here is a link to our house and the details that our realator did.. maybe you can get some ideas. http://www.inthebeach.com/28wc.html

I wish you much luck and a quick sale.

Brigitte
 
Wow, Brigitte,

That is a NICE house, very bold colors!!! I heard the Toronto market is still pretty hot and houses sell really fast. I wish I could say that of our market here in AZ, we even made the news on CNN on how badly the market is doing. I am glad you sold yours fast!

In Laura's case, I don't think it is the marketing or lack thereof! She sounds pretty happy with what her realtors have been doing. She is getting a lot of traffic and that is what marketing is supposed to do, get people IN the house, the house has to sell itself.

Obviously, nicely done brochures, outlining the best features of the house are a great thing to have. But I don't think a beautiful brochure will sell an overpriced dog house (not that I think Laura's home is a dog house or overpriced).



Carola
 
OK so I talked to my realtor last night & she didn't think a stager was at all necessary. She said the way I had my furniture arranged actually gave a good idea of the options people would have when it comes to arranging their own furniture. I asked her if I should remove my workout stuff & put it on the porch & we considered this for a little bit, since my front porch is enclosed & has a beautiful slate floor, we didn't want to clutter that up too much either (some of my larger workout stuff is already out there).

There definitely aren't any pet smells--I finally had the heart to get my rugs & sofas cleaned of Cosmo's smells (she was quite incontinent towards the end there).

My realtors really are great--they're making their daughter stand outside one of the condos that's having an open house this w/e & hand out flyers for my house around the corner. }(

I wouldn't call my paint colors dark, but they're not light either. I took a really long time choosing them & of course personally I think they're beautiful, but who knows, other people might hate them. That's such a personal thing.

So our plan is, if we don't get any offers after Sunday's open house, we'll drop the price to $330K, which is the lowest I'm willing to go. Also I'm offering 2 years of free permit parking (a whole $120 in costs LOL). We figure that will 1) reassure people that the parking is available & 2) be a cost savings incentive, even though the cost is nominal.

I personally have looked at many, many houses over the last few months & I just cannot believe some of the stuff that's selling compared to mine. Dumps out there selling for more than mine much quicker. It's really quite baffling. But after everything I've looked at, & considering Carola's 3 things, my price is definitely right, if not a little low.

Thanks all for the advice. I'm not at all insulted by any of it--I'm willing to consider anything & everything at this point so I can wrap this up & move on with my life!
 
I just wanted to agree with Carola about the importance of staging! I don't think people even considered buying our house until at least half of our stuff was gone! I would have hired one, but had to move before we could sell our house. Before we put our house up for sale, I would often go to open houses in our neighborhood to take a peek. The ones that were professionally staged ALWAYS were the first to go (and the market was declining then in Northern Virginia).

Carolyn
 
Well, I can't help but feel bad about making the pet comment. I'd completely forgotten about your losing Cosmo so recently. :-(

I really am sorry, Laura.
 
Oh please don't feel badly. Jeez, w/all the personal tragedies we vent about on the forums I don't expect everyone to remember all of mine.

I do still miss the poor old girl though. Even her yucky smell.
 
We are going throught the same type of problems with the sale of our home. Up until a couple of weeks ago we had a realtor, who after extensive quesioning on my part, just wasn't doing the advertising that we needed. They were putting us at the end of their priorty list. So at the end of the contract we hired another realtor, who were known for their advertising, (which is key in this case), and we have had two offers. They were pretty low offers too, but at least we're getting offers now. Plus, the realty team we are with gives us instant feedback and has the potential buyers fill out a survey to what they liked or didn't like about the place so we can get an idea of what needs improving. The survey goes directly to our email site so that it's discreet on both parts, and there's apt to be more honesty that way.

Sorry to babble, but maybe it's just your realtor.
Let us know what happens.

Carrie

http://www.3fatchicks.net/img/bar072/slider-but5/lb/209/145/182.0/.png[/image][/link]

http://www.picturetrail.com/uid6743693"
 
I am sorry, but I just have to butt in here again. Let me backtrack a little bit here, I have been an agent for almost 10 years now, but I also have a 5-year business degree with a major in marketing, so aside from real estate I know a little bit about advertising and marketing, not only from the real estate side.

I know a lot of people are under the impression that advertising to the general public is extremely important and is selling the house! To them a realtor is only doing their job if they advertise the heck out of the property.

Nothing could be further from the truth! Of course agents do newspaper/magazine advertising but in all reality it is not targeted towards selling your house, it is targeted selling/marketing the agents' services. If the house sells, great. But newspaper advertising and direct mail is a long-term strategy to create name-recognition for the agent NOT selling any listing.

Most agents will send their new listings flyer/post card and just sold listing cards out to specific areas (their geographic farm areas mostly) and not to a target group for that one particular house that they are trying to sell.

If you look at it from a marketing point of view, the agent would have to send out thousands and thousands of flyers to maybe find a few people who may think about buying a house. And then that house that is advertised has to have exactly the features they want and it is in the price range. I would say the odds are very slim. The agent would have to cover huge numbers of households for the advertising of ONE particular house to have an impact.

That usually is not feasible, getting a few thousand $$ in commission there is no way an agent can spend thousands of $$ on advertising/direct mail.

So in general an agent will send out 250 to 500 postcards (some more some less),I would say finding a buyer that way is like hitting the jackpot in the lottery. It can happen but it is unlikely.

I believe that most qualified and serious buyers are working with real estate agents. Why wouldn't they, agent's services are not paid out of pocket by the buyer. And a good agent can save a buyer a lot of time and effort.
Therefore, if an agent want to not only list a house but actually sell it, I do think that the majority of marketing should be geared towards the real estate community since this is where the qualified buyers are.

Just think about it for a moment, if open houses and advertising/marketing/direct mail were so successful, why wouldn't the majority of us sell without an agent and save a lot of money. Truth is, advertising and pretty brochures don't sell houses.
Pricing, location and condition do.

It really is one of my pet peeves but I am getting off my soap box now. Just wanted to give you some food for thought!

Have a good one!

Carola
 
Carola, what's the best approach, then? (I'm not selling now but I suspect I will in the next few years.) What should one look for in a realtor? The last realtor I used ended up in prison because he was selling crack on the side!!!! :eek:

Marie
 
Well my experience is less extensive but I completely agree w/Carola. From my point of view what's important is getting the word out to the agents, not the public. After all, looking for a house can be very overwhelming & since the seller pays commission most people will go directly to an agent when looking to buy.

We did do a broker's open house the first week it was listed. Yesterday we had a "caravan" that's basically taking new, less experienced agents through houses since they're the ones usually selling the smaller ticket homes.

We're thinking after this w/e a major drop in price & another broker's open, & possibly some kind of an incentive for the buyer's agent. I've been surprised at how agent-driven this whole process has been. If a prospective buyer's agent loves my house, their customer sees it much differently than if the agent doesn't like my place.
 
The last realtor I used ended up in
>prison because he was selling crack on the side!!!! :eek:
>
>Marie


Oh lordy, seriously? Was he arrested while he was working on selling your house???? Talk about a bad experience, good thing he didn't hide his crap in your house.

I have had the best success with marketing to the real estate community, meaning to other agents, because they are the ones who most likely will bring the buyer.

I do agent/broker open house, sometimes have it catered or just offer some appetizers and drinks and invite agents in the area. Nothing better to get real estate agents somewhere than free food :)

A lot of realtor tours, caravan or limousine tours, everything to get agents to see the house. If it shows well, it's priced well, it will have an advantage over the other gazillion properties in MLS in that price range, if I am looking through several hundred properties to show and I have seen the house, it showed well, odds are I am going to pick it to show to my clients.

Networking with other agents in the same area. Nothing better than having good relationships with other agents. The ones that know each other and like each other, we try to help each other out. There are certain agents that some of us know are sheisters and will avoid their listings like the plague. I feel very bad for people sometimes because they probably wonder why their house doesn't sell, or barely gets any showings, little do they know it is the agent they picked who is the obstacle to selling their home.

I am a big proponent of working by referral, to find a good contractor or a good agent, ask your friends, family, business associates, etc who they would recommend and why.
I probably would interview 2 or 3 agents (just to get different views on pricing) and you will get 3 different opinions. I would ask lots of questions, what will they do to sell your house. What's their take on the current market, how can current market challenges be overcome, etc. What's their track record? And the most important question: Why should I hire you?

Have them give you a pricing opinion (and DO NOT tell them upfront how much you think your house is worth or how much you want) and have them explain and show you why they decided on that price (based on what comparable sales). If one agent says a much higher price than the others, I know temptation is great to go with the one who says the higher price. Makes sense, doesn't it? He/she says it's worth more, let's go with him/her.
I would say that the pie-in-the-sky number agent would be a very dangerous route. Some agents come in at much higher price recommendations than the house is worth, in other words, they are "buying the listing" and either just use that house to get other buyers or sellers, or later on start beating up on the poor Seller to lower the price.

By then the damage is already done, and a lot of times Seller then have to lower BELOW what they could have sold for had they priced it right to begin with.

Just use common sense when you interview the agent(s). Do you have the feeling they know what they are doing, or do they just talk the talk and not walk the walk. Try and get references from them and actually call and ask how the agent did (make sure it's not the Mom or second cousin, just trying to help him/her out :) ). Don't be afraid of agents that are newer to the business, a lot of times they will bust their behinds more for you, because they need to make a name for themselves.

Overall, I would look for an agent who doesn't brag about all of his/her accomplishments but genuinely cares about you and family. I would go for someone who does less talking but more asking.

Hope this makes sense.

Carola
 
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