My Boise Home Listing Is Going To Expire
There are a lot of youtube and Realtor articles directed towards home sellers in Boise, Meridian, Eagle, and Nampa Idaho who have previously had their homes listed by other agents with few or no showings. I just got done reading and watching a lot of these. There was a lot of good information but it was scattered amongst a lot of bad and just plain untrue information.
In one of the best videos that you may have seen the agent says that 30% of Boise area listings expire. He also points out that the agent who lists your property is critical. He claims that their are three reasons why homes don’t sell. 1. Condition. 2. Marketing. 3. Price. He is partially correct. It all sounds great and the video is very well done. Looking at it is impressive because it is so professional. But the truth is that a lot of “listing agents” spend a lot of time and money selling SELLERS. Not buyers and agents and brokers! A big percentage of second listings expire too. In fact a look right now shows that this impressive agent has more expired and withdrawn listings than sold listings in the MLS!
All agents and brokerages who have been in business for years have some. But a record of more listings withdrawn or expired than sold should be a wake up call! This is something you should ask. Have us show you.
Let me address the condition, marketing, and price question:
1. Condition: Yes this can make a difference. In fact sometimes people will buy a house in poorer condition because they think they are buying for less and can make it worth more with a little paint, clean up and www. Yes it is helpful to have your home clean, uncluttered, get the personal stuff out and all that. But DON’T spend a lot of money! Remodeling especially in 2011 just doesn’t get your money back. This is more important in a market where prices are rising. But be careful now.
2. Marketing. This can be very deceiving. I hate to admit it, but marketing is pretty much the same whoever lists your home. This is the internet computer age. Anything in the MLS can be found on Zillow, Trulia.com, Realtor.com, and hundreds of individual websites. Flyers, magazine, newspaper and other adds are just not where buyers find property anymore. They find it on websites like this one, and the national sites. It all comes out of the MLS, Multiple Listing Service (system). It is important to have lots of good pictures and a good description. When listing with anyone have them show you the FULL DETAIL LISTING in the MLS. Shiny papered flyers, news paper, real estate magazine adds etc. are to sell you as a seller. Open houses almost never result in a sale. But they allow agents who do them to meet buyers. If the buyers like your home great. But most of the time they are just looking and listing agents have their subagent, buyers agents their to find buyers for other homes.
3. Price. I hate to say it because easier to be a flashy, know a lot about marketing agent (to sell you the seller). But right now price is king. There are lots of homes on the market. Recently I lost a listing to another agent because that agent insisted she could get $30,000 more than the same model, same builder of the same house in the same area, brand new never lived in! How do you compete with that?
We have a very high rate of closures on homes we list. We work hard, have great web sites, spend a lot of time and money marketing but I have to be honest. Price is king. You want your agent to SHOW you ALL of the recently sold homes in your subdivision, and part of town and see what the true comparable sold for. You need to consider your time lost. Banks are underpricing bank owned homes right now and getting multiple offers and often selling for above listing price. So why are they going to pay any of us more? They just aren’t.
If you are paying $2,000 per month in house payment, taxes and insurance, five years or less into your loan, selling 10 months from now means you will need to get $20,000 more for your home than you would have to today to break even!
I am sorry for being so blunt. A lot of our sales have been listings listed after two or three other agents have listed and had our client’s listings expire. Unfortunately many are short sales. Too often people are wowed by the agent who puffs and yes even lies saying he or she KNOWS they can get more. We won’t do that. We will show you what homes like yours are selling for. If we list it we will help you with all the staging, cleanup tips, tell you to turn your lights on and all that. We will have you on the best websites in the area and market like crazy. But we will not puff you up by selling you that we can sell for too much. We will also not try to get you to sell for less than your home is really worth. We will do all we can to get you the most money for you that we can. The difference will be that we will SHOW you what your home should sell for. We will not push you. We would rather you go with another agent until the listing expires. Then like many others have, call us. We will be here to help.
Please call me before you chose to list your home. I promise you I will have one of my best agents meet with you or meet with you myself and give you a straight honest evailuation. Call Jon Gosche, Broker, GRI at 208-870-2115. Don’t let anyone trick you into months of lost taxes and house payments. If you need to sell you need to talk to us.