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The situation with a noisy neighbor is likely to be unnoticed by potential buyers -- it'll bug you but I would suggest NOT making any police reports lest they show up on "online police blotter". If the disrepair is really out of hand or the noise crosses the line from nuisance to danger I suppose you have to do something, but really it is better to focus on your positives than the general negatives that you cannot fully control.
The staging and freshening is EXCELLENT and in such cases should be an big reason to stay put until sold.
When I see long-time vacant, I wonder if the current owner has been keeping the heat/AC at a proper temperature to prevent the development of possible maitenance issues like mold.
Personally, if finances for the seller aren't in the equation (they can afford to pay for 2 places to live for a while) here is my best to worst options list:
Best:
1) Vacant but well-staged. This makes showings easy, allows a buyer to see the house with neutral furniture, and is decluttered.
2) Vacant and clean, but not staged. Clean is important if the house is going to be vacant, but showings are still easy. Vacants are usually the first houses a buyer will look at, because access is so easy. Some buyers don't like to see an empty house (can't visualize their furniture in the rooms), but if it is clean, most are fine with it.
3) Occupied. This isn't really a bad option, but you have to have the house clean all the time, decluttered, and depersonalized.
4) Occupied by a tenant. This is the worst option in my opinion. Tenants tend to not care if the place sells, so dirty dishes, toys on the floor, etc aren't really a big deal to them. In addition, they may have non-optimal furnishings that do not show the home in the best way. There are definite exceptions and if you get a really good tenant, then you can be tied with option #3.
I would so much rather see an empty house. But the bottom line is: What's better for you?
Quote:
Originally Posted by gvc8
also , a vacant house will not hide all those dirty spots that seem to appear out of nowhere once you start taking down pictures and moving furniture out.
That's probably a good thing. If you buy the house, you'll know that the furniture is not hiding any surprises.
Personally, if finances for the seller aren't in the equation (they can afford to pay for 2 places to live for a while) here is my best to worst options list:
Best:
1) Vacant but well-staged.
2) Vacant and clean, but not staged.
3) Occupied.
4) Occupied by a tenant. This is the worst option in my opinion. Tenants tend to not care if the place sells, so dirty dishes, toys on the floor, etc aren't really a big deal to them. In addition, they may have non-optimal furnishings that do not show the home in the best way. There are definite exceptions and if you get a really good tenant, then you can be tied with option #3.
We've had a real problem with number 4 before. We moved to Texas and rented out our home in South Carolina for a below market rate. After six months we became weary with the rental situation and put the SC home on the market with rental agency as the listing agent.
Fast forward another six months with a number of showings but no offers. Our agent shows the home, but isn't recognized by the tenant, and discovers that the tenent trash talks the home for the entire showing. He makes a number of claims of defects and issues that for some reason he never reported to the agency. (IE he lied.) Since a year has passed and he was on a month to month lease, we opted to bring the rent upto market levels and the tenant gave notice to vacate, as we desired. Within two weeks we had an offer and within six we had closed.
While waiting for the old place to sell, we rented (which gave us time to check out our new area) and "camped out" on furniture from garage sales, target and IKEA. Other than missing a few items, it worked out very well and a side benefit was we learned how much less we could live with and still really enjoy ourselves.
Wow!! Thanks so much for all the excellent replies.
To address a few, I love the listing of the best option (staged and empty) on downward. Excellent points. Also, another excellent point regarding keeping the heat/cooling on at an appropriate temperature to make sure there are no added problems caused by not doing so. I also agree regarding rentals. However, there are many renters who I am sure take better care of the homes they rent than some owners so. However, we have one next door; sadly that is not the case.
Additionally, I agree that a PD report showing ordinance complaint calls is a negative. Yes, it would bug me to have a showing and have that go on, but I would not call the PD on that. When I get up daily at 5 a.m. and it has gone on for three hours and it is after 11 p.m.; I will and do call with noise violation complaints on that. How that may look to others looking at our home be darned because people need their sleep to function at work.
I think I might have answered part of my own question somewhat today. Just saw a website showing my zipcode and the fact that there are 286 homes for sale, zero new homes for sale and 172 foreclosures. Yep, that is just one zipcode. Now, not to get too negative....I did see about 5 homes in the paper that sold in my zipcode during the first week of January, 2010. There is nothing saying that we cannot be one of them.
However, if it does not sell and if we move on and sell empty....has anyone done that? Did it go well? Is there anything that you learned in the process that if forced to do that again you would remember to do? I am presuming we'd need someone to check the property from time to time. Is that offered by a realty company for a price? I know we'd need to have pool maintenance, etc. What else am I missing here? You all have great thoughts and ideas...please keep them coming. Thank you again.
As a listing agent, I go by our vacant properties at least once a week to check on them. You will still need to have someone do yard, pool and any other service you require. If you get into winter you'll need to have the house "Winterized" by a plumber.
So if you hire an agent ask them if they will do this to check on the house. Nothing irritates me more than to see a house with trash all over the front porch, a swimming pool half full, items of neglect because the listing agent hasn't been to the house in 2-3 months.
Do you have a neighbor or family member who will also keep an eye on the place ? You might make sure they have a spare key to get in. Let the police know it's vacant, maybe they can watch a little closer.
Also talk to your homeowners insurance agent if you vacate.
As a buyer If I know the house is vacant it automatically makes me think I'm going to offer less. The thought process being that I assume they are now paying double mortgage/rent and are going to be somewhat desperate to sell. And you can tell a staged house vs. a lived in one.
But if they can afford to stage the house nicely, doesn't that show that they are less desperate? To me it does. I don't look on a staged house as "desperate sell". There is a little bit of that stigma for a vacant, unstaged house, for some buyers. But as the seller, nothing says you have to take an undermarket offer just because someone made it. You are perfectly within your rights to reject the offer out of hand if it is too low. If it is close, then you have a starting point to negotiate, which is better than you would have had if the buyer had left after a 5 minute viewing because the house was too messy to even see the condition or get a feel for the plan. Yes, there are negatives to every one of the options, and not everyone will agree, but I still think a vacant staged house is the best selling option.
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