If you are thinking about selling your home, or your property is already on the market, you might have heard the horror stories. You may have heard the whispers that homes get stuck on the market, unable to sell for years. This might sound like nonsense, but it’s absolutely true.
On average it will take about six months for a home to sell. Some go a lot faster within a few weeks. It’s been known for properties to also sell in a matter of days. There are always outliers, and there are indeed properties that take years to sell.
When they finally do, they don’t go for anywhere near what the seller hoped for. Why is this? What’s happened? That’s what we’re going to look at today so that you can hopefully avoid the disaster scenario.
The Market Shifts
A lot of people who were trying to sell during the 2008 housing market crash experienced this. The economy shifted, and we were all thrown head first into a depression. But people selling their properties had it worse. Suddenly, there were no buyers looking for homes and certainly not at the prices that they were hoping for. House prices took a dive, and here, sellers were left with two options. Either, they could continue to try and sell the property or take it off the market.
So, what’s the right choice in this situation? Well, you can leave your home on the market, but usually, this isn’t the smart move. First, you need to speak to your agent because they should advise you on how to proceed. Typically, they will suggest that they can get a sale but may have to reshape the marketing for your home. They may also ask whether you are comfortable lowering the price. If you move fast in this situation, you can lower the home significantly before other people do, making it look like an absolute steal. This allows you to get a quick sale, but it doesn’t work.
If you can’t sell, you can take it off the market. Bare in mind, when you put your home back on the market, you will need to pay for the service again and possible use a different agent. Switching agents makes it more difficult for buyers to see your home has been on sale multiple times. There’s a stigma attached to homes involved in multiple sales. People often assume they are damaged goods.
The Wrong Agent
It’s equally possible that you have chosen the wrong agent or company to handle your property sale. This can be detrimental too. There are companies today that offer you the absolute bare minimum has a home sale option.
They put your home online, and that’s it. They don’t have people show your home, they don’t invest in other forms of marketing for your property, and they certainly don’t give you a personal service. All they’ll do is put the home on the market, put it online and you’ll be responsible for the rest.
When you get a sale, they’ll step in and take a cut, but that’s about all you’ll see from them. It’s a bad move to use agents like this. A pro company selling property is the service you should be using. They do exist, and while you may have to pay a little extra, their services are well worth it.
If you do research some of the home selling horror stories, you’ll usually find that they received terrible service from their property team. Invest in the best, and you won’t have to worry that your estate agent is providing you with the bare minimum they need to give to get paid.
It’s important to remember at this stage that your home is a product like any other. If a product isn’t marketed correctly, people won’t buy it. It doesn’t matter whether they can find it online or not. As you will know, finding something online doesn’t automatically mean you want to purchase it. You need the right sell point and marketing angle. That’s just what a great estate agent will provide.
The Big Repair
It is possible that the reason your home won’t sell is because there’s something wrong with it. This could be a serious issue with the drainage, structural damage, damp or possible even asbestos if it’s an older home.
All these issues, all the problems need to be fixed before you put the property on the market. If you don’t do this, then you’ll essentially be trying to sell a home with expensive repairs. Now that’s fine, and it is possible to sell a property like this, as long as you’re realistic. In other words, you shouldn’t try and sell for the full market value because that’s not going to happen. Nor should it.
We should also mention here the importance of finding the right price to sell at. It’s quite well known that estate agents will usually market a home a little above what it’s actually worse. This is due to the fact that buyers will typically put in offers lower. So, that gives you some extra room for negotiations or may even mean that you won’t need to negotiate at all. You might just be happy to accept the first offer that comes in. It’s also why you shouldn’t argue and try to get an estate agent to put your home up at a higher price.
The price of your home isn’t determined by its quality completely but rather supply and demand. If there’s better houses in your area selling at lower prices, your price needs to be lower. If there are limited numbers of people looking to buy, the price needs to be low.
Unfortunately, it’s fair to say that a lot of disaster scenarios are caused by the sellers because they don’t listen to the expert advice when they put their home on the market. They think they know better. That’s a risky move, and you might just find yourself two years down the line with a home that won’t sell wondering what went wrong.