The first thing I ask my clients is if I may have their permission to tell them the truth. I follow that question by stating that I know how much families will put into our homes and the memories that those homes have provided them with. I also understand how difficult it is to start talking about your home as strictly a marketable asset, or worse having to take some guidance on personal decorating.
I know that there are a lot of agents who are great at agreeing on everything that the homeowner is saying and reinforcing those beliefs. This way the agent is able to get the contract and go on their way.
The Truth
This is where everything should start. The first truth is, sometimes our home is not worth what we think it is. For many years we were taught that you will buy a home and then you should expect a 5% increase per year. These last several years have been very hard on the market. I truly believe that the market is coming back, but it is not where many of us would like to see it yet. If you have time I have provided several reports on this matter. You are more than welcome to review the weekly updated market report for The Greater Mobile Area, West Mobile ( 36609 and 36695) , Semmes, Tillman’s Corner, Theodore, Grand Bay, Irvington, and the Spanish Fort and Daphne area. I provide these weekly so that I can keep up with what is going on as far as housing price and Market Absorption. I will go into pricing a little further down when we talk about positioning.
I will give you a great example about Truth when it comes to marketability.
“ My husband , who I am afraid is not one to hold personal health high on his list of priorities, has for years refused to go to the doctor unless he was so sick he could not work. I have been begging him to always get a yearly physical and start watching what he eats. I would say that over the last 8 years he has gone through 4 doctors, and each time my husband would come home saying they were late for the appointment and were rude to top it off.
This past year I noticed that he went to the same doctor twice, which was very unusual for him. Later, I also heard him talking to a co-worker and my husband was telling him how great this doctor was, that he would never see anyone else. That night I had to ask him, what was so great about this new doctor? He told me that for the last 7 years every time he went to see a doctor they always wanted to talk about his weight and cholesterol. With the new doctor it had never came up. I then asked him about the fact that he he did in fact have a belly and what would happen when his new doctor said something. He looked at me and simply said “ That’s easy find a new doctor.”
I’m sorry, now back to real-estate. I just wanted to point out that as human nature goes, we have a tendency to go with the people who tell us what we want to hear, even if we even know what we want to here might be wrong.
The fact is I will be paid a considerable amount of money to properly market and sell your home for the most value. I have even started the Guaranteed Sale Program, for those sellers wanting to go ahead and purchase their new home here in the Mobile area. That being said, I believe that as my customer you are owed several things from me. The truth about the marketability of the home and any thing else that might hinder your home from being on the top of every buyers’ list. I will offer this along with the best real-estate marketing available here in Mobile and Baldwin Counties.
Lets Get Your Home Sold!
Positioning:
“ You’ve lost 80% of your negotiating power once you have a offer”
When pricing your home, a CMA simply won’t do. This common method of pricing usually is out dated information. That added to with most standard CMA’s position your home with the market. This works unless the market is allowing homes to sit there for 180 days or longer. Then, after sitting there for 180 days, the listing has expired and now you are having to drop the sales price of the home.
When looking at the pricing of your home, I want to use the most up to date trend analysis. This trend will allow us to position your home against the market to have the highest perceived value.
I do this by not just reviewing the market trend sheets monthly, or just when I am coming to list a home. My staff and I work with the numbers to make sure we have a weekly market report so that we and our clients can stay on top of the market. If you would like copy of a PDF version of one of the areas , please let me know.
