Pricing & Marketing
Marketing and Pricing are often two of the aspects of selling a home that are discussed most when selling a home, and for good reason. While both are vitally important to the successful sale, they are also best approached counter-intuitively to how most other products are sold or marketed.
Rare is the seller who doesn’t want to sell a home for the most money, with the best terms and the least amount of hassles. These are tips on how to achieve that goal.
First and foremost, you need to make sure that you’re working with a seasoned realtor who has a phenomenal track record for success, and has their finger on the pulse of the market. Agents with less experience and knowledge may be doing “on the job training”, very possibly at your expense! You likely would prefer to have eye surgery done by someone who’s done it numerous times, right? Or have a pilot with thousands of hours of flying under their belt rather than one that is just starting out? You get the idea …
Marketing is the process of getting the word out about the home. It is primarily done online, with some offline marketing channels as well. There are numerous sites that advertise all the homes that are on the market. Yet, some homes sell right away while others (even with all the online and offline marketing) fail to sell. There is a time and place for all types of marketing, no doubt. That said, the most important aspects of marketing are actually done (a) by realtors, and (b) by a skilled photographer. The ability of the listing agent to contact and engage buyer’s agents, the enthusiasm that a buyer’s agent may have when recommending a given home to their own client, and having high-quality photos that put the home in the best possible light - these more than anything else are the most important marketing aspects that help get a home sold quickly and for the most money and best possible terms for the seller. The photos in the MLS essentially serve as today’s first showing of a home - if they make a good impression, they'll lead to an actual showing. If the agent representing the buyer is knowledgeable and the price is on target, the home should fare extremely well.
Pricing, meaning a home’s list price, is essentially the “sticker price”. Much of how buyers respond to the home will depend on how the home is priced within their market. Location, staging, condition, age, the “five sense appeal”, and of course the market trends at that time are all part of the detailed and complicated process of determining exact market value for a home. It has long been understood that “market time” is the #1 enemy of any seller - be it Chicago, Miami, Boston, Los Angeles, or anywhere else. How well priced your home is can spell the difference between getting the most money possible, or losing thousands upon thousands of dollars and seeing your dreams of what could be fade away. That in no way means that you should do a “fire sale”, nor should you “test the market” either. You should simply trust your realtor, understand where the market is at the moment, decide if you want to sell, and price your home to sell at the highest possible price.
