HARD time selling home w/Wilderness Oak behind house (real estate, to rent)

[nursey*32]

I am hoping someone can help me. We are not the ONLY house that backs up to Wilderness Oak. We have had our house on the market since the end of March 2012. We've had 40 showings (yes, forty) and all the feedback has been extremely positive on the interior and exterior of the house BUT they decline because our nearly half an acre backyard backs up to Wilderness Oak.
Anyone have any suggestions? I've already called the city and they can't divert Wilderness Oak from behind our house :-) No really, if you have sold a house in the same circumstances, maybe you could offer some help.

[Rustybolt]

Originally Posted by nursey*32

I am hoping someone can help me. We are not the ONLY house that backs up to Wilderness Oak. We have had our house on the market since the end of March 2012. We've had 40 showings (yes, forty) and all the feedback has been extremely positive on the interior and exterior of the house BUT they decline because our nearly half an acre backyard backs up to Wilderness Oak.
Anyone have any suggestions? I've already called the city and they can't divert Wilderness Oak from behind our house :-) No really, if you have sold a house in the same circumstances, maybe you could offer some help.

If the price is right, people become more accepting of conditions they perceive to be undesirable. That is the only alternative I can see for you.

[BlacknRedGT]

I am an agent and it will simply come down to price. The only other creative options are as follows:

1) Hire a designer to come into the house to see what can moved around or removed completely to help the house show better.

2) Consider getting professional HDR photography. The cost is normally around $200 and involves a layering process that will make your photos stand out.

[nursey*32]

Thanks ya'll. Unfortunately -or fortunately - we've had a pro stager do the lay out inside and outside, and we have HDR photog on realtor.com (I think that's a huge reason for the number of showings we've had). Out of ALL of the showings we haven't had one single offer. The feedback we get from the potential buyers are they absolutely love the house and what they would get for the price we're asking but....
The one thing we kept our agent from doing was over guesstimating and setting the initial selling price too high. We started and still have it listed $20k less then other homes that have sold around us. We really can't afford to come down any further. Agent fees would kill us if we went very much lower.
I so thank you both for replying with some feedback.
Any good karma everyone can send our way to get it sold is so appreciated. We really don't want to rent it out. We have the time to sit it out.

[Camper1]

What is Wilderness Oak?

[goodmanm]

Is the total size of your lot a half acre or is your back yard truly a half acre? Not sure if this applies to you but I did a google street view and could clearly see into the backyards of houses along the road.

Just to offer some perspective when I looked at houses I immediately ruled out places that backed out out onto busy roads. Traffic and the resulting noise is only gonna get worse. Not to mention the accidents caused by speeding and drunk drivers which inevitably seem to end up in the homeowners back yard.

Maybe you could plant trees at the rear of the property. Doesn't help in the short term but in the long term will screen the property from the road.

Best of luck to you.

[Bo]

Originally Posted by Camper1

What is Wilderness Oak?

Wilderness Oak is a busy arterial street in Stone Oak. It's also an elementary school, but I doubt that backing up to an elementary school would be a detriment.

[prim8]

Could this be a circumstance where you pricing it too low might make buyers wonder why you're discounting the property?
I don't know if that really happens with real estate but it's the only thing I can come up with.

[GrandviewGloria]

Probably too late now, considering you've spent all that money on staging: but a BERM between you and whichever noise source (street or school) is 'Wilderness Oak' would probably solve the problem. If it's a street, I'd have the thing graded to cause an errant auto to flip over BEFORE it got over the berm and into the rest of your yard.

And obviously, the berm which should have been added should have been planted with a dense screen of foliage. Florida Jasmine, maybe? But there are so many Texas natives which are dream plants, that part would be easy.

[Newk]

Lower your price.