As we’ve told you time and time again, selling your home has much more to do with timing and emotions than many individuals may think. Before placing your Cape Coral home for sale, you need to be aware of exactly how this timing and emotional combo work together.
Understanding the Skeptical Buyer
First of all, home buyers (and this includes every last one) are somewhat skeptical and guarded. Let’s face it, buying a pre-lived-in home is much like purchasing a used vehicle. Everyone knows that the good points are capitalized on and anything that could be perceived as even remotely unattractive is either talked up with carefully worded jargon (“cozy vacation hideaway” translates to “incredibly small home”) or gone unmentioned altogether.
A potential home buyer is hoping for the best, but well aware of the games that are often played. They are making a somewhat emotional decision (they have to like the house, the location, and the layout enough to ‘see’ themselves living there), but they are also trying to discover what the downside of a particular home is. This leads us to the biggest mistake Cape Coral property sellers often make, an incorrectly priced home.
The Number One Mistake
Incorrectly pricing your Cape Coral home can lead to a number of unwelcome problems. When a home first hits the market, that’s when it will receive the largest number of showings. Now that MLS listings are largely Internet driven, a new home on the market is ‘front and center.’ That’s the time to put your best foot forward (remember we mentioned timing earlier).
A new MLS listing will enjoy approximately two weeks in this ‘sweet spot’ where potential buyers will eagerly make appointments to view the home and make their decision largely based on the asking price, the condition of the home, the location…you know, the normal factors.
Now, let’s say the home is inappropriately priced. As a Cape Coral property owner, you may think you can always lower your price, so why not put it on the market for what you’d really like to receive? That’s where the trouble often begins. Once a home has gone past it’s two or three weeks and falls past the 30 day marker without an offer, skeptical buyers will naturally begin to rationalize the possible reasons why. Maybe the home has foundational or structural problems…Maybe other, more educated buyers passed it up because of the age of the home, or the neighborhood, and on and on the list of possibilities goes. Do you see where I’m going with this? Your home could be in pristine condition, with an updated kitchen, in a prime location, but the timing throws up red flags that potential buyers will try to figure out. How can you avoid this?
Price Your Cape Coral Property Realistically From the Start
Your real estate agent will provide you with a comprehensive list of asking and selling prices of nearby Cape Coral homes. Use this to your advantage. Instead of insisting on your home’s appraised value or what you paid for it several years ago, allow your agent to guide you to a realistic price that will be a win/win situation for you as well as the buyer. Nobody likes the idea of taking a loss, and you may not have to, but in today’s market the assessed value of your home has little bearing on what the buyer is willing to pay.
Additional and very valuable keys include:
- Adjusting your Cape Coral home price to fit in with Internet searches. As we said, more buyers are finding listings by way of email updates and Internet searches. Instead of pricing your home at $155,000, by dropping the price to $150,000 your property will end up falling within many more search parameters.
- Study selling prices more than asking prices when using area information. Also take a look at how long the homes that sold were on the market before selling. By doing your research before listing your Cape Coral home for sale you can effectively bypass a good amount of frustration.
- You may need to wait. That’s a mouthful, but absolutely true for some sellers. If you are in no real hurry to sell, and absolutely unwilling to price your home according to the current market, it may be better to wait until home values climb than to have your home sit on the market for 6 months or more.
- Beware of agents who make promises of big profits. You’ll always be able to find someone who will tell you what you want to hear, but that doesn’t necessarily mean there is any truth to it. Rather than choosing a real estate agent who promises to get you your asking price, it’s far better to have an agent who will sit down with the facts, help you assess your home’s strong points, come up with a realistic asking price, and then aggressively market your property.
Pricing your Cape Coral property correctly doesn’t mean you will lose money. What it DOES mean is that your home will be positioned to sell in the best possible time frame with a minimal amount of stress. That just makes good sense.
If you are ready to put your Cape Coral home on the market, we would be happy to sit down with you and discuss your plan of action. Give us a call today.
