Home Staging Tips

Home Staging Tips

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Selling Your House in a Sluggish Market

Selling property in a sluggish market can be a disappointing and gut wrenching process but it is often necessary for one reason or another. Unlike stocks and bonds, real estate is not the most liquid of assets to turn into cash when the going gets rough and money is needed immediately.

There is only one way in which real estate can truly be sold in a sluggish market such as the one that is rocking the world at the moment - offering an exceptional value to consumers.

Play up the attributes of your property – great location; big backyard; a pool; breath taking views from your living room; finished basement, etc. but don’t forget that staging sells homes.

There is something cold about an empty house. It could be painted impeccably and meet every possible standard a family has and yet feel cold and uninviting. You can easily overcome this by contacting a local furniture rental store and picking out furniture that will match at least the primary rooms of the home in order to make the home appear lived in and homelike.

The primary rooms that you will want to appear ‘lived in’ are the living room, dining room, master bedroom, and all bathrooms. These are the rooms that essentially sell homes and it is important to make them appear neat, orderly, and well cared for. If you have the funds for every room in the home then by all means do so. It is a huge selling point, particularly for those who are trying to sell homes quickly. I would strongly encourage you to keep this furniture as long as the home is being shown regularly.

You will want to do so much more than simply putting furniture in the property you are trying to sell. You want to create an atmosphere or warmth and comfort. This means you want to have prints on the walls, mirrors, plants, and pillows. Staging a home can absolutely lead to a higher offer and a quicker sell, even in today’s sluggish market.

In a buyer’s market there will be low offers, insultingly low offers the first time around. Do not take this personally. They are not insulting you or your property; they are only attempting to gain the most with spending the least money possible.

Do not attach an emotional value to the price of the property. This is simply bad business. No matter how much sweat, tears, and blood have gone into your house you must realize that this is just a business transaction for you and for the person placing the bid. You cannot afford to run off potential bidders by becoming insulting or feeling insulted by their bids. Make a counter offer and see what happens rather than letting emotions rule the day.

How To Sell Your House in 30 Days

www.30dayhomeauction.com

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“CNN Open House” on How to Sell Your House Quickly

Use real estate auctions to sell your house quickly. Learn how to sell your home in 5 days.

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What is a Quick Sell?

In real estate, a short sale is when a bank or mortgage lender agrees to discount a loan balance due to an economic hardship on the part of the mortgagor. The home owner sells the mortgaged property for less than the outstanding balance of the loan, and turns over the proceeds of the sale to the lender in full satisfaction of the debt. In such instances, the lender would have the right to approve or disapprove of a proposed sale. A short sale is done to prevent a home foreclosure - a bank will choose to allow a short sale that will result in a smaller financial loss than foreclosing. For the home owner, the advantages include avoidance of having a foreclosure on the credit history. Also, a short sale is typically faster and less expensive than a foreclosure.

Lenders have a loss mitigation department which deals with short sale transactions. Typically, lenders do not accept short sale offers or requests for short sales until a Notice of Default has been issued or recorded. Lenders have to approve of any buyer’s or listing agent’s commission in advance. Junior liens may need to approve of the short sale. Frequent objectors to short sales include tax lieners and mechanic’s lien holders.

It is common for a lender to omit updating the zero balance and settlement option on the mortgagor’s credit report, or even flat refuse to do so “due to their financial loss.” The forgiven amount is considered as income for the borrower and as such liable to be taxed. However, after the signing of The Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007 by President Bush, amendments have been made to remove such tax liability and allow the borrower and lender to work freely together to find a solution beneficial to both parties. This protection is limited to primary residences so consult with a tax advisor to ensure you qualify.

What is the best way to quickly sell a house without lowering the price any more?

There are 3 major factors in a home sale, price, condition, and location. You can only control the first 2 obviously. If your house has been on the market a long time than you need to revisit the ones you control. It sounds like you have already reduced the price so you need to consider the condition. There is no “silver bullet” in real estate so it is hard to say more without knowing more. Check your pricing compared to SOLD comparable homes to yours, if you are working with an agent ask them to take you to see active comparable homes to yours so you know what the competetion is and how they are priced and staged. That way you can do what you can to be better than your competition and you will know you are priced well so an appraisal should support the value. If you have not had any showings then unfortunately it is probably price. If you have had a good number of showing then it is probably condition. The average is about 10 showings equals one offer. Remember too that value is ultimately determined by the sold comparables and WHAT A BUYER IS willing to pay. 

How can we make a quick sale for our home? Use a realtor or for sale by owner?

Our home has been on the market for 7 months now. At first we had an agent from Remax for six months and now we signed with an agent from Exit. We have had no luck what so ever. They don’t seem to be avertising very well so we are wondering if we should just go ahead and list for sale by owner and we can do all the advertising ourselves. Not to mention we could lower our asking price a good $10,000-$15,000. We bought our home through for sale by owner so we know a little bit about the process. We are not looking to make a huge profit off of our home with the way the market is, we want to move out of state and are only looking to get a price in which we can pay off our remaining balance on our loan. We did lots of remodelling already and always try to keep it nice and tidy but this house will not sell.

Try the FSBO route and see how it goes, you can always go back to a realtor. Buyers are often struggling to come up with the cash for a down payment, so consider creative ways to help them conserve cash. If they express needs during the showing, a remodel of a room, or redecorating, consider offering to prepay work with a contractor prior to closing in exchange for a full price offer, vs the normal %discount most people are accepting in your area off list price. Price the house 5 to 10k more than you are willing to take, and indicate willingness “to work with” a buyer who seems interested but wants something done to the house to make it just right for them. 

How Can I sell My HOUSE QUICK?

I understand the market is slow. Currently I reside in Maryland, and I DESPERATELY need to sell my house due to school districts before the beginning of the school year. My house has been on the market for 4 months and we have gone through fixing appliances, cleaning the house, throwing junk away , painting, planting…basically my house is in perfect condition. its better than when I bought it.

I have lowered the price to 310,00 - Its the lowest price in the neighborhood .

I DONT KNOW WHAT ELSE TO DO!! Its getting so stressful and I simply have to move!

You think that the TV show gets every house sold ? They ONLY show you the ones that make for good TV. Simply, there may be no buyers in your price range. People are absolutely fooled about the “value” of their house and their equity and paper profits. Unfortunately you have found this out the hard way. It’s all supply and demand. Try raising the commission offered to the selling agent.

What is the best way to sell my house as quick as possible?

I just refinanced after my husband’s death….I don’t want the house anymore - the loan is 93,000 and it is worth 100,000. I just want to walk away. I don’t have the time or energy to try to sell. I have another house waiting - owner will hold the mortgage and I can get 20% down out of an IRA - but he wants to sell ASAP and he has contingent offers. I don’t care if I lose on this house - I just want out!

It sounds to me like the stress of your husband’s death might make you make a big financial mistake. Don’t foreclose on the house, you’ll ruin your credit rating. Get yourself a good agent. A good agent can help you sell fast and help you deal with the owner for the other house. Otherwise, sell fast by making the house spotlessly clean. Make sure it looks new. Paint job, broken stuff fixed, etc. Pay someone to help with that. You’ll lose less money this way.

My home is in foreclosure - is there anyone to buy it as quick sale and can I still make any money?

My home is going into foreclosure. If there is anyone who can buy it as a quick sale, can I still make any money off of it? I have about 15,000.00 equity.

15k equity is not very much. So you want someone to buy your house and give you the money? I don’t think that’s going to happen with the way the market is. When they foreclose on a property the starting bid is whats owed to the bank. If the bidding goes higher (if your property is desirable to an investor) you will get what’s left over, minus liens.