Selling House

[OhMari]

We have been decluttering, destashing, removing, selling, throwing away, giving to GoodWill, and staging our house for almost a year now. We finally signed with First Weber To sell our house and they put a For Sale sign on our lawn last week. About the only thing it did was it let our town know we are selling our house. No one wants to look at our house, they all just want to know where we are moving too.

I is sort of like the same situation when we got a puppy, neighbors that never talked to me, came out of their houses to meet my puppy. Now they see me walking with my dog and have no problem coming out of their houses and asking "where we are moving too." People actually stop while driving and ask.

I have talked to my neighbors more in the last two years, than in the last 25, why does it take a puppy and a 4 sale sign to get people to talk. Plus selling our house is like "child birth", everyone wants to tell their story. I just hope the house sells, but it makes me sad too leaving my neighborhood and house after 28 years. We had one showing last night. I had 3 neighbors tell me what they thought and their opinions of the people that came. Crazy.

Our realtor wanted an "open house Sunday, but we need to get the carpeting out of the kitchen and vinyl laid next week, so we are waiting till next Sunday, I am sure every neighbor will be coming over..

So, how long did it take for someone to schedule to go look at your house?

 

[tvguy]

We have been decluttering, destashing, removing, selling, throwing away, giving to GoodWill, and staging our house for almost a year now. We finally signed with First Weber To sell our house and they put a For Sale sign on our lawn last week. About the only thing it did was it let our town know we are selling our house. No one wants to look at our house, they all just want to know where we are moving too.

I is sort of like the same situation when we got a puppy, neighbors that never talked to me, came out of their houses to meet my puppy. Now they see me walking with my dog and have no problem coming out of their houses and asking "where we are moving too." People actually stop while driving and ask.

I have talked to my neighbors more in the last two years, than in the last 25, why does it take a puppy and a 4 sale sign to get people to talk. Plus selling our house is like "child birth", everyone wants to tell their story. I just hope the house sells, but it makes me sad too leaving my neighborhood and house after 28 years. We had one showing last night. I had 3 neighbors tell me what they thought and their opinions of the people that came. Crazy.

Our realtor wanted an "open house Sunday, but we need to get the carpeting out of the kitchen and vinyl laid next week, so we are waiting till next Sunday, I am sure every neighbor will be coming over..

So, how long did it take for someone to schedule to go look at your house?

Do you have a lockbox? I sold my parents vacant house last year, 20 people toured the first day. 80 toured in the first 17 days, had 3 offers in that time.
In hindsight, a great realtor who marketed the house well, and helped me find the "right" listing price were the key.

My next door neighbors have had their vacant house for sale now for 2 months, lockbox. They have had 8 people tour in 2 months. In their case, as much as I hope they get their price, they are almost $100,000 above what the house is worth. Inside is nice, stunning. But the tile roof has waves in it and is 35 years old, and there is visible dry rot, and they are of the mind set that a tile roof never needs to be replaced.

 

[OhMari]

Do you have a lockbox? I sold my parents vacant house last year, 20 people toured the first day. 80 toured in the first 17 days, had 3 offers in that time.
In hindsight, a great realtor who marketed the house well, and helped me find the "right" listing price were the key.

My next door neighbors have had their vacant house for sale now for 2 months, lockbox. They have had 8 people tour in 2 months. In their case, as much as I hope they get their price, they are almost $100,000 above what the house is worth. Inside is nice, stunning. But the tile roof has waves in it and is 35 years old, and there is visible dry rot, and they are of the mind set that a tile roof never needs to be replaced.

Yes we have a lock box. We only had a key for the back door, we lost our front door key years ago. The lock box wouldn't fit on the back door, so we "finally" went to Menards and got a new door lock.

We had 2 realtors do a walk thru and they both came in within a thousand dollars of each other. We are selling the house for $149,900. Our house is sitting on 3 lots. We almost have a acre of land. My dh built a 4 car garage. On the side of our house used to be our ball diamond and the kids play set, swings, fort, slides. We built that too and a Day Care came and dismantled it and rebuilt it at their business. We are right next to our local school too. I will post a link later while I am at work, my IPad stinks at copying and pasting.

 

[ronandannette]

How much traffic you get will depend largely on the state of your local market. If, like in TV Guy's case, it's hot, a lacklustre listing realtor won't hurt you too badly because all the buyers out there will have their own realtors bring it forward to them. If things are slower you need someone who knows how to evaluate correctly, promote locally and give you good advice on how to maximize the appeal. Even so, in a buyers' market don't be disappointed if you're not getting 4 or 5 showings a day - perhaps the demand simply isn't there in your area. It does make sense for you to personally gain enough knowledge about your local situation to be confident that you're being properly represented though. And don't depend on stories from the neighbours about how things went for them in the past - market conditions change. Good luck!

 

[LJSquishy]

We are in the process of selling our house...closing is next week, actually!

Once the house was listed, we had someone call the next day for a showing. Then a second person looked at it a couple of days later...then no showings for almost 2 weeks (this also happened to be around the 4th of July which they explained was DEAD in the realty world) but we wanted the house to move so we lowered the price. The day we lowered it, we had someone call to see it the next day and then had a last minute showing that day also. Showing #3 placed an offer on the house but it was a lowball offer. We countered and they accepted.

So...we only had 4 showings before getting an offer. We wanted to move quickly so we lowered our price since our original asking price was testing the market in our neighborhood and knew it may have been too high.

BTW, open houses almost never sell your house...they are a way for your realtor to network and pick up potential buyer clients who don't already have their own agent. I would reconsider having an open house unless it's for other agents only. We didn't have an open house so we never had neighbors peek inside. I'm sure they took fliers though and looked it up online, though! If they wanted to peek inside now I wouldn't mind (like while we are packing) because we are thrilled to be leaving this neighborhood! We hate it here! Our neighbors don't take care of their yards or homes and I hear dogs barking outside all day (owners leave them out) so good riddance!!!

 

[aprilchem]

It sounds to me like you have some not-so-friendly neighbors and that moving might be a good thing! I think that how many showings you have really depends on the quality of your listing, the realty market in your area, and the price you've set. We're currently in the market for a second home and there are some listings that we would be interested in seeing, but price is set so high above market value that we don't think the sellers would ever come down to a fair price. Those listings get marked off our list right away. There are other listings where the pictures make it clear that the house is either so outdated or in such disrepair that it's too much work for us.

I would definitely agree with your Realtor on the carpet in the kitchen thing, though. I would take it out.

 

[BadgerGirl84]

I think marketing and promotion by a sellers agent will have very little to do with a home being sold. These days, all buyers are on Zillow looking for homes they want to see...if your moms is on the MLS and Zillow, that's enough marketing. Location, price, quality of home, layout, lot, school district, staging...those all come into play.

We are selling our home. 14th showing since early June. We just dropped the price a bit. Hope it sells quick!

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

 

[tvguy]

I think marketing and promotion by a sellers agent will have very little to do with a home being sold. These days, all buyers are on Zillow looking for homes they want to see...if your moms is on the MLS and Zillow, that's enough marketing. Location, price, quality of home, layout, lot, school district, staging...those all come into play.

We are selling our home. 14th showing since early June. We just dropped the price a bit. Hope it sells quick!

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

In my case, the agent sent out postcards, and there were a number of folks with the postcards in their hand when they came.
Zillow is interesting, my mom's house was there, but some realtors refuse to post there because it shows how many days the house has been on the market.

 

[Cowboysrule]

In my case, the agent sent out postcards, and there were a number of folks with the postcards in their hand when they came.
Zillow is interesting, my mom's house was there, but some realtors refuse to post there because it shows how many days the house has been on the market.

I always assumed the Zillow pulled their information from other locations not that realtors posted it there.

 

[barkley]

I think marketing and promotion by a sellers agent will have very little to do with a home being sold. These days, all buyers are on Zillow looking for homes they want to see...if your moms is on the MLS and Zillow, that's enough marketing. Location, price, quality of home, layout, lot, school district, staging...those all come into play.

We are selling our home. 14th showing since early June. We just dropped the price a bit. Hope it sells quick!

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

I agree that most people these days are looking to the internet for listing information. that said-a person's realtor needs to make sure the listing on-line is well done. when we purchased our current home we used the internet to determine which homes we would take the time to actually go to and look at often based on what was and wasn't shown in the on-line listing photos. if the written description says there's x number of bedrooms then I want to see photos of them, if it goes on about a large kitchen with newer appliances-do more than one photo of the counter (and if the listing says there's tremendous storage, for gosh sakes don't have photos showing cereal boxes on top of the fridge and the counters cluttered up with every small appliance known to man-it makes me think there's no storage whatsoever). a family room and a living room? show me photos of each.

the listing is the first impression people get these days-and sadly some are really lacking. we almost passed on looking at our current home but decided since we would be in the area to include it in our search. our realtor had the same reaction we did when we walked in-the photos did not do it justice, and many of the upgrades were entirely missing from the listing description. had the listing reflected the home it would have sold long before we made an offer.

as for marketing, a good realtor will reach out to their network and nudge them into noticing your listing so it will stand out among the dozens of new ones that hit the mls weekly. we insisted our realtor include some form of marketing to realtors outside our geographical area b/c we were commuters and knew the value of where we lived vs. where we worked. he agreed as a condition of getting the listing but said he didn't think it would make much of a difference-it ended up making the sale b/c an out of area realtor saw the fax he sent with the listing and thought immediately of a potential buyer who had been searching for a home with all ours had to offer (and once they drove out to see it realized it only added 20 minutes to their existing commute while saving them tens of thousands in purchase price and property taxes).

 

[Andtototoo]

In terms of selling, it depends upon your local market and how well your house is priced. A great home at a reasonable price in a slow/dead market will not have lots of showings and it may take months to sell. A great home at a reasonable price in a hot market will have tons of showings very quickly and will sell fast.

As an example, I know someone whose house has been on the market for 2 years. The house is staged, decluttered, updated, now priced as low as they can go without it going into a short sale and they have had 3 showings in the last 3 months. In contrast, I know someone whose house is (IMO) quite mediocre and their house sold within 30 minutes of the listing going live.

We have been decluttering, destashing, removing, selling, throwing away, giving to GoodWill, and staging our house for almost a year now. We finally signed with First Weber To sell our house and they put a For Sale sign on our lawn last week. About the only thing it did was it let our town know we are selling our house. No one wants to look at our house, they all just want to know where we are moving too.

I is sort of like the same situation when we got a puppy, neighbors that never talked to me, came out of their houses to meet my puppy. Now they see me walking with my dog and have no problem coming out of their houses and asking "where we are moving too." People actually stop while driving and ask.

I have talked to my neighbors more in the last two years, than in the last 25, why does it take a puppy and a 4 sale sign to get people to talk. Plus selling our house is like "child birth", everyone wants to tell their story. I just hope the house sells, but it makes me sad too leaving my neighborhood and house after 28 years. We had one showing last night. I had 3 neighbors tell me what they thought and their opinions of the people that came. Crazy.

Our realtor wanted an "open house Sunday, but we need to get the carpeting out of the kitchen and vinyl laid next week, so we are waiting till next Sunday, I am sure every neighbor will be coming over..

So, how long did it take for someone to schedule to go look at your house?

We had the same experience the last time we moved regarding unfriendly neighbors. We lived there for 10 years and couldn't even get anyone to wave back to us. We had a moving/garage sale and out come the neighbors saying, "You don't know us, but we've lived behind/next door/across the street from you ever since you moved in." And they want to know where we are moving and why. I told them, "We've moving because this town is so unfriendly." At which point I heard from every single person, "But why would we be friendly to you? You're not from here. You're a stranger." After the 3rd comment like that, my girlfriend helping me with the sale goes, "Yeah, I see why you're moving..."

 

[usnuzuloose]

In my case, the agent sent out postcards, and there were a number of folks with the postcards in their hand when they came.
Zillow is interesting, my mom's house was there, but some realtors refuse to post there because it shows how many days the house has been on the market.

When we were looking we always ask how long it has been on the market. We sold our home on a short sale during the crisis. It only took 3 months. I was thanking god we did not have that on our credit as a foreclosure. But we had a bidding war going on for ours. I kept it up at all costs so it would sell. Where we are at right now there are quite a few on the main st that are for sale. But I don't know how long we will be here.

 

[jerseygal]

We have been decluttering, destashing, removing, selling, throwing away, giving to GoodWill, and staging our house for almost a year now. We finally signed with First Weber To sell our house and they put a For Sale sign on our lawn last week. About the only thing it did was it let our town know we are selling our house. No one wants to look at our house, they all just want to know where we are moving too.

I is sort of like the same situation when we got a puppy, neighbors that never talked to me, came out of their houses to meet my puppy. Now they see me walking with my dog and have no problem coming out of their houses and asking "where we are moving too." People actually stop while driving and ask.

I have talked to my neighbors more in the last two years, than in the last 25, why does it take a puppy and a 4 sale sign to get people to talk. Plus selling our house is like "child birth", everyone wants to tell their story. I just hope the house sells, but it makes me sad too leaving my neighborhood and house after 28 years. We had one showing last night. I had 3 neighbors tell me what they thought and their opinions of the people that came. Crazy.

Our realtor wanted an "open house Sunday, but we need to get the carpeting out of the kitchen and vinyl laid next week, so we are waiting till next Sunday, I am sure every neighbor will be coming over..

So, how long did it take for someone to schedule to go look at your house?

One piece of advice is to not get "sucked" into neighborhood nonsense and gossip and don't reveal much at all. Quite frankly, some realtors can also capitalize on unfortunate life events like deaths, sickness, divorce, illness, financial problems, so we have always kept our "reasons for selling" very PRIVATE offering "vague" info as to our plans!
My personal feeling is if someone was unfriendly during the time you lived in a residence, you don't NEED them to be friendly NOW!
A LITTLE TOO LATE!

BEST OF LUCK with the sale of your home! BE PATIENT and BE INFORMED as to comps, pricing, competition! Don't rely on your agent exclusively!
Do your OWN HOMEWORK!

 

[MOpGrad2013]

Wishing you the best!

We rent our home, but have several recent sales in the neighborhood. It really depends on the realtor's marketing and the outside. The homes that have online pictures can either entice others to come see for themselves or have them running. Our neighborhood is very "keep to yourself" until a life changer and then it seems everyone is outside. We are just private, not really rude. We wave at each other. And when salesmen come to the door asking for others' information, we clam up for everyone's protection.

As for how quickly they sell, no rhyme or reason. Next door bought a house that is definitely too small for them and was sold for more than the larger home down the street, but they love it. Another house has been on the market for 2 years (they were with one agency showing for lease and another for sale at same time) and there was the house that went on and off market in 2 weeks. We saw the realtor sign go up and then sold on it the following weekend. Unfortunately we also have the foreclosures (or preforeclosures). All the homes were built by the same company so standard laminate wood flooring, stainless appliances, heavy tiles, back deck and glass panel front doors found in/on each home.

 

[MOpGrad2013]

I always assumed the Zillow pulled their information from other locations not that realtors posted it there.

Our landlord (real estate agent) posted the pictures of our home on Zillow, Turlia (they merged now, I think), the agency website and several others. He was big to tell us he would be taking them down.

 

[Darcy03231]

We sold our house within 48 hours of listing it for 98% of the list price and we listed a bit on the high side. We weren't in any rush to sell (we're downsizing). The first person to see it bought it.

It helps that we live in one of the most desirable neighborhoods in the city and with most sought after school system. Houses rarely come up for sale in our neighborhood and when they do, they tend to sell fast. The realtors couldn't find any comps in our neighborhood that sold within the last year.

We decluttered (packed about 2/3 of the house into a storage POD and had it removed to their storage location), redid the kitchen and two bathrooms. We replaced old, outdated window treatments and had the home professionally cleaned. It all paid off though. We sold at $30,000 higher than the realtors thought we would. Because there were no comps in our neighborhood the appraiser was able to go outside and use comps from the next town over (which has much higher prices).

 

[tvguy]

I always assumed the Zillow pulled their information from other locations not that realtors posted it there.

Well, my neighbors house went up on their realtors website only for a month. Then it was pulled from there, and put on Zillow, only. The price cut 10 days ago was reflected only on Zillow.

When I sold my mom's house, it was up on both.

The investors who bought my house had it up only on their site, then it went to zillow, now it is only on their site. Zillow doesn't even show it as for sale.

 

[arminnie]

My DH and I are currently looking at homes to buy. Realtor.com and Zillow have been a great help in narrowing down what to look at.

Here's some of my observations about the listings we see. This is in general and directed at you.

Do not take a picture of the kitchen or bathroom or any room with a 100 misc. "things" cluttering up everything. It makes it look like there is no storage. I've seen bathroom counters with dozens of bottles on the counter and wet towels sitting in the floor.

I'm trying to get a clue about the house - not your furniture. Some people post 2-3 pictures of their dining room table with no picture that gives information about the room itself. Four pictures of the couch but none of the fireplace.

Four shrubs across one wall in front does not constitute "extra landscaping".

Is it so hard to make up a bed or put the toilet seat down for a picture? It turns people off to think a slob has been living there.

Be honest in the listing. Claiming a "view" because the neighbor has two pretty trees is misleading. So is claiming "waterfront" because of a hot tub.

Don't post pictures that are so bad with the lighting that you can't see anything. A black picture with a lamp shining provides no info.

If you truly do have a beautiful view post pictures of it. I can't upgrade the view, but I can update a crappy old kitchen.

If we do get to the negotiation stage it is not relevant to me how much you paid for taking down all the kitchen cabinets and putting in shelves. I hate it and will have to pay to put cabinets back in. sorry.

What you paid for anything in the house means nothing to mean if I don't like it. Or it is not of any value to me. For example: I put in extra electrical outlets inside and outside and a new power box. It cost a fortune but most people don't care if it's there or not.

If you are in a soft market look what other homes are selling for - not what you paid for it originally.

Good luck! Last time I sold a home I had zero interest for two months - almost no showings. Then I got two offers at once - one for full price with no concessions for upgrades etc that I had been prepared to offer during negotiations.

 

[Disney Doll]

Regardless of how much you dislike your neighbors, don't put them off. DH is a realtor and he says often a neighbor sells a house. They have friends or relatives who have told them "If a house ever becomes available inyour neighborhood let me know".They are a partof the network.

It has always been my opinion that the misconception of "an open house doesn't sell your house" is just that...a misconception. Mostly everyone I know who has purchased a home saw it for the first time during an open house. I can't even count thenumber of houses DH has sold in his career to pople who saw it during the open house. Is the realtor hosting your open house going to ask any lookers if they are working with a realtor already and if the answer is no, try to obtain them as clients? Of course they are. But a good realtor is also trying to sell your house. They don't make any money if their listing (AKA your house) doesn't sell.

The three most important things in real estate...location, location, location. If your location is good and the house is priced appropriately for the condition it's in, it will sell.

 

[ChristmasElf]

We have been decluttering, destashing, removing, selling, throwing away, giving to GoodWill, and staging our house for almost a year now. We finally signed with First Weber To sell our house and they put a For Sale sign on our lawn last week. About the only thing it did was it let our town know we are selling our house. No one wants to look at our house, they all just want to know where we are moving too.

I is sort of like the same situation when we got a puppy, neighbors that never talked to me, came out of their houses to meet my puppy. Now they see me walking with my dog and have no problem coming out of their houses and asking "where we are moving too." People actually stop while driving and ask.

I have talked to my neighbors more in the last two years, than in the last 25, why does it take a puppy and a 4 sale sign to get people to talk. Plus selling our house is like "child birth", everyone wants to tell their story. I just hope the house sells, but it makes me sad too leaving my neighborhood and house after 28 years. We had one showing last night. I had 3 neighbors tell me what they thought and their opinions of the people that came. Crazy.

Our realtor wanted an "open house Sunday, but we need to get the carpeting out of the kitchen and vinyl laid next week, so we are waiting till next Sunday, I am sure every neighbor will be coming over..

So, how long did it take for someone to schedule to go look at your house?

Open Houses will not sell your house! The only thing it will accomplish is allowing your neighbors to walk thru your house to be nosy.

Make sure your realtor has a great photographer to take flattering pictures of the inside rooms in your house. Kitchen, Living room, Master bedroom and Master bath are important pics to show as well as your backyard.
Ask your realtor to show you his/her marketing plan, what internet sites it will be on, Zillow, Trulia, realtor.com-just to name a few are all ways people will be able to look at your home.

Never turn down a potential showing as you never know which showing will be the "one".
Most importantly, make sure your house smells fantastic!! Have the carpets professionally cleaned, all baseboards really clean, fix anything that is broken like leaky faucets, cracks in walls, windows really clean etc. If people see anything wrong, they automatically will think the house could have other things wrong regardless if it does or not.

Plant some flowers by the front door.
Get rid of any signs of animals and dog dishes.
Play soft music during showings
Take down any personal family pictures so people can "see" themselves living in the house. Plus its good for security as well. (this way people won't know how many kids you have, girls vs. boys, etc.

Best of Luck! Its a good time of year as people always seem to be looking especially as back to school gets close.

Only give your realtor 4 month listings. Three if you can. That way, if you really don't like the job they are doing, you can go with someone else.

We have moved and sold 9 houses and not one was ever sold in an open house.