Home sellers always want to know what is the “best” price to put their home on the market. However, most do not know what the market is doing in their area and how their home compares to other homes for sale in their neighborhood. Realtors usually look over the past 6 months to see what has sold in the neighborhood and compare that with the home seller’s home. This does give a “ball park” but it takes a little more research to come up with a “competitive price”.
All homes are different by the way they are maintained, their location, upgrades, and a host of other things that needs to be considered in determining a selling price. For me, I went to appraisal school to see how they put together their appraisals. I am not an appraiser but the information helps me understand how they put a certain value on certain things. I want to make sure the seller can see how I came up with the recommended price based on many factors and not solely relying on the Multiple Listing Information to come up with a competitive price. This information takes longer to put together but I have always felt that it gives my seller an “advantage” in considering the price to place their home on the market at.
Seller’s need to understand that Buyer’s Agents will run comps on a home before submitting an offer. They may call the Listing Agent and discuss how the price was arrived at and that is when a strong Listing Agent must be able to defend how they came up with their estimate. This allows the Buyer’s Agent to be able to communicate back to the “potential buyer” what their initial offer should be. Once in contract, the Buyer’s mortgage company will send out someone to do an appraisal and depending on the knowledge and skill of the Appraiser they will either agree with the price settled upon or come in with a lower estimate which could make the deal fall apart.
Posted by Roxanne DeBerry on
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