June 14, 2008: Price matters -- but so does everything else: When buyers come to see your home, they're looking for reasons to reject it, not to buy it
If price matters more than anything else in the sale of a home, why bother to clean, repair, stage and market the property for sale?
In a buyer's market, if a home is priced above its market value, it probably will not show. If it doesn't show, it can't sell, and this by itself is all the argument anyone should need to price a home to the current market.
The corollary proposition is that, if your home is properly priced, it should get frequent showings.
So the battle is won, right? All you had to do was price your home to the current market, and you attracted the attention of buyers. Victory is at hand.
Not quite.
Your home is showing, and that's good. But if it is dirty, if there are obvious repair issues, if the space is cluttered and confusing, if no one has worked to point out why it's such a good buy -- other houses will sell and yours will languish on the market.
As long as you're priced right -- and price can be a moving target in this market -- you'll get showings. But if your home is not a better value than the other houses your buyers are seeing, they'll buy those homes instead.
That's exactly what you would do in their place, isn't it? When you're picking through the melons at the grocery, you aren't looking for the ones that are bruised and shopped over, unsightly and unappetizing. Why would you expect buyers to buy a property that you would pass on in a heartbeat, if you were in their shoes?
When buyers come to see your home, they aren't looking for reasons to buy it. They're looking for reasons to reject it, so they can move on to the next home. The one they buy will be the one that raises the fewest objections, for the money. If you want that money, you have to do everything you can to take away your buyers' objections -- before they think to raise them.
Not willing to do that? It's not a problem. Just cut your price.
Greg Swann is the designated broker for BloodhoundRealty.com, a full-service Metropolitan Phoenix real estate brokerage. This article originally appeared in the West Valley regional sections of the Arizona Republic.
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