Is there a thread for people selling their house?

[JuneChickie]

Ty ,, now the people keep wanting to add things onto the purchase agreement , Im about ready to walk from the sale. I can't believe how they pretty much
ask for everything in the house except your wallet.
Selling it is half the battle and getting to closing is the other half.
ALL I do is worry , worry , worry about this these days.

Much luck to all .

 

[7beasley]

congrats on the house sale!!! but you are right -- getting through the P&S and closing is just about as stressful as actually selling the house.

We are getting discouraged as well. We are on the market 4 weeks this Sunday. We dropped our price from $229K (list price) to $214,900.

We continue to get feedback that the house smells like our dog - so we are having the carpets professionally cleaned next Wed. The dog doesn't go to the bathroom in the house but he is a stinky smelly dog (despite regular baths) - he is a bulldog and is gassy and has a particular smell to him -- and I guess its all over our house -- hopefully cleaning the carpets will help.

we are also getting feedback that people don't like our kitchen cabinets - not much we can do about that though....

I HATE this process --- the realtor thought if we came down to $199K we might sell much faster - which is all well and good but we can't do that right now because it won't really leave us enough money to buy our new house...

AAHHHAAHHH I HATE THIS PROCESS!!!!!!!!

-Nicole

 

[Plantlady]

congrats on the house sale!!! but you are right -- getting through the P&S and closing is just about as stressful as actually selling the house.

We are getting discouraged as well. We are on the market 4 weeks this Sunday. We dropped our price from $229K (list price) to $214,900.

We continue to get feedback that the house smells like our dog - so we are having the carpets professionally cleaned next Wed. The dog doesn't go to the bathroom in the house but he is a stinky smelly dog (despite regular baths) - he is a bulldog and is gassy and has a particular smell to him -- and I guess its all over our house -- hopefully cleaning the carpets will help.

we are also getting feedback that people don't like our kitchen cabinets - not much we can do about that though....

I HATE this process --- the realtor thought if we came down to $199K we might sell much faster - which is all well and good but we can't do that right now because it won't really leave us enough money to buy our new house...

AAHHHAAHHH I HATE THIS PROCESS!!!!!!!!

-Nicole

We are getting the dog smell comments too. We installed new carpet.. and don't let the dogs near it. They are in the laundry room, when inside.. so people say the laundry room stinks. *sigh* Well... at least the carpet smells nice! Once the dogs move out.. it will be FINE!

we're at 7 weeks. we dropped the price a couple weeks ago.

 

[binny]

well we are having a conference call with the big bosses tomorrow. Please say a prayer that something good will come of it. New BMAs are saying that we should sell for about $60,000 less than what we paid for it and $40,000 less than what we owe.

SO. I dont know where we go from here. We have to do something. They want us in Denver by summer.

Has anyone ever rented out a property?

 

[luvflorida]

Well, we finally sold our home. Im so glad and relieved, now we are praying we make it all the way to closing.

Yeah!! Here's some to help get you through closing!!

Our house has now been on the market for 1 year and two weeks. We have decided to take it off the market at the end of May. We're tired of paying for two houses, so we're going to rent it beginning August 1st. Of course, then I'm sure we'll have a whole new list of concerns.

I left a much longer explanation on Binny's house rental thread, but thought I'd also update here.

for everyone still trying to sell!

 

[phorsenuf]

Not much news on our front. We have an open house today but those don't usually present many lookers but we figured we'd try. I know a few teachers and co-workers that are looking for a house so I posted it at the staff website. Maybe we'll get some traffic from that too.
If the house doesn't sell over the summer then my and my son will stay and he'll start school for the year here. Hoping we don't have to do that.

We had one looker and he was supposed to come back with his wife but never did. The feedback from his was good though.

Good luck to those within negotiations and to those waiting.

St. Joseph, eh?

 

[Meriweather]

Good luck to everyone!! It is a hard market right now......and a very stressful situation.

Our house has been on the market for 14 months now......6 months of paying two mortgages. Money is very tight

 

[Plantlady]

We dropped our price again, yesterday. Only left a bit of wiggle room. I'm thinking, the ridiculously low price should sell it for us.

We had a second viewing on Friday, but this same guy has looked at SOO many houses, I don't think he'll ever find the perfect house. Our realtor is showing it on Tuesday. the first time since we've listed it that SHE"S shown it.

We are moving in a bit over a month. No place to move to, because this place won't sell. But, i'm sure it will work out great.

 

[Disney Doll]

Wow is an understatement! And around here an unfinished basement it seems is the kiss of death!

Really??? I am so surprised by that. The last thing I would want is a finished basement. If I bought a house with a finished basement, I'd still probably use it as storage, finished or not. I'm not a "hang out in the basement" kind of person...I like to be upstairs where I can see the sun coming through the windows.

 

[luvflorida]

We dropped our price again, yesterday. Only left a bit of wiggle room. I'm thinking, the ridiculously low price should sell it for us.

That's what we thought, too. Everytime we lowered the price, it would bring in a few lookers, but not a single offer. And, the last few times that the agent has shown the house, she has sent us e-mails sayig she is SURE this is the one. According to her, there is a ton of activity on our house confused3) and the last few showings have been "very positive" and "the house is exactly what he/she is looking for".

Our house is priced low for this area, there is nothing that needs fixing or repairing, it is in a very desirable subdivision (on a lot that is more private than most) in a town with excellent schools. However, it is just not selling.

It is so frustrating because there isn't anything we can point to that would help to sell the house. If we knew the house needed a new roof, for example, or new carpeting, or whatever, at least we'd know what to do to help our chances of selling.

We've sold several houses over the years and they've always sold within a few months (in one case, within a few days!). I guess the way things are now with the economy, we just have to roll with it and hope for a better market in the future.

I hope everyone here has more success at this selling thing than we've had!

 

[Disney Doll]

I inherited a house which we have had on the market for 3 months, with only 7 showings. This is very discouraging as our area was list #2 for best places to still buy a home. The house is in good condition, priced right and still no interest. I have suggested that we do more updates, but as my husband says, it wont matter what updates we do, if no one tours the house.

What do you all think of this??
The Realtor sent me information on a new program that his firm is offering. For 295.00, due at closing the house is entered in a contest. everytime 48 homes in the program are sold the selling agents are entered in a contest to win 10k. The winner will be chosen at a huge party attended by the participating agents. It is a one time fee and the house would be continually entered in subsequent contests.

Another question?? What do you think a Realtor should be doing to sell your house, beyond listing it with MLS, placing a sign in the yard, brochures?

Is it a house you inherited that you are not living in or a house you inherited that you have been living in?

If it is a house that has never "cost" you anything...you never paid the mortgage, never had to pay any bills for it...then I would drop the price of the house to sell it. It will be pure profit for you, as the house was never an expense to you.

 

[Disney Doll]

I havent seen this thread for a few days....Maybe everyone has sold their homes....We wish!! We have had a couple more "looker's" in the last week, but no offers. The realtor held an open house on Sunday and had 4 couples come through, one couple showing interest but saying that they had to sell their house first. I got a call yesterday at 8 am setting up a showing for the evening, then at 630 got a call that it was cancelled and would reschedule for the morning, then another call saying that they wanted to reschedule for 7pm....OK..... what's the deal?? Anyway, they toured the house and left a comment this morning that they liked the house, lots of sq. footage for the price but they went with another home that required less updating.
I don't know what to do at this time..... Do we update and have to raise or stick to our price or do we state in the listing that update allowances will be offered? The Realtor said he doesnt like to state such things in the listing, but it appears we are loosing potential buyers because of the update issues.

Well, you have a pretty clear indication of what the [roblem is, at least, so that's good.

Realistically, you can probably update for a lot less than people will ask for an allowance for.

 

[Disney Doll]

See bolded.

The house is totally solid... no roofing or structural problems. The cabinets in the kitchen and bathrooms are in great shape but are 35+ yrs old, Paint them a light color. the carpet in the secondary bedrooms needs updating very badly, pull it out and see what's under it..maybe hardwood that is in nice condition because it's been covered by carpeting??? If not, recarpet with somethingneutral. carpeting in the formal/dining rooms, family, master bedroom have all been updated with a high end berber. However, my mom chose a patterned berber (I dont care for it) If you don't care for it, probably most other people don't either and then it just becomes one more thing for them to have to change once they move in.. It had soiled paths from her wheelchair/walker , but shampooing took care of that. The carpet wears like iron and will still be in good shape 10yrs from now but I dont think it appeals to the majority of people. If it doesn't appeal to the majority of people, replace it, regardless of how old it is or how it wears. The large entry has nice tile, the eat in kitchen has wood laminate flooring. The closet doors and bedroom doors are dark wood stain, paint them a light color some of the mini blinds need replacing replace or remove them . The house is priced well for the area. The appliances are all less than 5 yrs old, but are white. that shouldn't be a huge issue.
My question is....should we paint the cabinets, bedroom door/closets white, replace the bedroom carpets? There are a couple other things I have been trying to get dh to fix. A couple of the closet doors need new rollers and the hallway bathroom shower control keeps falling off (the knob). He says the shower is an easy fix....The closet rollers sound like a simple issue but we can't find replacemnt parts anywhere. Dh says that the house would have sold overnight a couple of yrs ago and that he is confident that we will sell it if we sit tight. I am more proactive and want to make it more buyer friendly.

If I was looking at your house, I would do one of two things:

~Offer you less money because of all those little things I'd have to do pretty much right away to make it to my liking

~Ask you for a pretty big allowance to fix all these little things

And that doesn't take into account kitchen cabinets that are 30 years old, even if they are solid and sturdy.

 

[Disney Doll]

Thank you!! We have 2 weeks of inspections and nail biting until this is a done deal. I still have things to pack up and move out of the house, one being my 22 yr old ds. He is not going to be a happy camper about this but he has been living there rent and utility free for 11 months.
Oh, and concerning the bathroom walls....The buyer didnt state that the walls needed to be painted in the contract and our realtor is saying just to leave them unpainted....I am very concerned about this. He has lead us down the garden path over the last 4 months and I dont want this to be a last minute bone of contention. Of course DH says he agrees with the Realtor and doesnt want to do anything with it because of all the concessions we had to make....I say we should at least put a tinted primer on it. What do you guys thing?
The clincher with this deal is that they want to close in 2 weeks....of course dh is going to be out of town for the majority of this time which leaves this in my hands. Oh well....at least it is under contract and we'll see what the roller coaster brings during the next 2 weeks.

Paint them white.

 

[JuneChickie]

Originally Posted by klmall
Wow is an understatement! And around here an unfinished basement it seems is the kiss of death!

Really??? I am so surprised by that. The last thing I would want is a finished basement. If I bought a house with a finished basement, I'd still probably use it as storage, finished or not. I'm not a "hang out in the basement" kind of person...I like to be upstairs where I can see the sun coming through the windows.

*** Around here an unfinished basement is like a kiss of death too.

Ours is half unfinished and yep we got quite a few saying they didn't want
the house because they would have to finish out the basement and didnt
want to incur the cost of doing that.

It is a 4 bedroom with 4 baths , so there just wasn't a need to finished
it out to make another room to put more "stuff"

But over half of our lookers did comment on that .

 

[IHeartTink04]

I'm pulling this thread out to vent little!!

So we have had our house on the market since October, we are now on our second realtor and was hoping she would be a blessing. Well it started out good and now we haven't had a showing in about two months, she has NEVER showed our house once, it is always other realtors and we have never got any feedback on the showings that we did have.

I have tried to call her and say "How is the market going?, Is what we are experiencing typical?" But I don't get much of an answer. What should I do?

Another problem I have is that when we do have a showing that we got about zero notice, on the last showing that we had they called 25 minutes before the showing!! I think we should get a little more notice than that!

I just read that the most houses are sold in June and we haven't had a showing yet! I really want this darn house to sell by the time that our baby is born but I am getting discouraged.

How is it going for everyone else?

 

[Plantlady]

Not good here.

 

[binny]

well we finally said goodbye to the old realtor new one seems very positive. We dropped the price quite a lot. Hopefully that will help. He has a much better marketing plan as well.


Planted St Joseph last week.

 

[mackeysmom]

Hi -

I just stumbled on this thread and thought I'd share my story:

I'm trying to sell my mother's house - I've lived in the house my whole life - my mom passed away about two years ago. Even though I've got two sisters who will share equally once the house is sold - it is my responsibility - 100% - to sell it (and pay for 100% of the upkeep and expenses until it is sold - instructions per her will that are being taken literally).

The house was appraised at $600K about a year ago. I put it on the market for $560K about nine months ago. Legal mother/daughter (three bedrooms over two bedrooms) with a full finished basement with a bathroom on each of the three floors. New boiler, new driveway, mostly new windows. Nice fresh coat of paint all around. Bathrooms and kitchens are dated (80's style) but overall in excellent condition.

Two major problems:

1) House is directly across the street from an elementary school. People are turned off by that. Very convenient - but I can see how you don't want a schoolyard of screaming kids at recess directly across the street.

2) Over $12K per year taxes

House has been on the market for nine months - lots of traffic, and a few offers that were not even a consideration ($400K to $425K). I try to be accomodating to anyone who wants to see the house - as the PP mentioned, sometimes you get less than 30 minutes notice - just enough time to grab the cats, light a candle and hide the litterbox But I never turn down any showing - I keep hoping that the next person will be THE ONE.

We've made a few price reductions along the way - the house is now listed at $519K. The sisters (and especially one of the brothers-in-law) think I should just sit on it until the market comes around. They still have that
$600K figure floating around in their head. But at almost $2000 a month to upkeep it - I don't have that luxury. Not to mention that me (and my two cats) don't need five bedrooms, two kitchens, three baths, etc.

The worst part is being in limbo - I can't even search for a small house for myself - I made the mistake of doing that in the beginning and fell in love with a house within my price range only to see it get sold - nothing I can do until my house in under contract.

Oh well, that's my story.

Good luck to everybody who is trying to sell also

-- Laura

 

[mackeysmom]

Planted St Joseph last week.

Funny you should say that - I went to the Religious Store in the mall today and they were out of St. Joseph statues. The clerk told me they can't keep them in stock

-- Laura