Can't sell the old house! (Dallas, San Antonio: appointed, for sale, rentals)

[AMJ27]

Originally Posted by Dr.Mom

THANK YOU! Finally someone understands! (And I'll rep you for it ). We had our place appraised before listing it on the market again b/c we knew that the market had fallen off. The appraisal price was drastically lower than we had the place listed for but we sucked it up and listed it for a bit lower than that. When we weren't getting many showings after 30 days, we lowered it again - significantly. Our agent says that nothing within spitting distance of our price point in our Township has sold within the last 3 years. The potential buyers who came through never had anything negative to say about the price (one wanted more land, one wanted less land, another wanted to be further from neighbors). Honestly, we could cut our listing price in half and still not sell. There are just no buyers here. Our agent is actually recommending that we NOT reduce the asking price again as she doesn't feel it will do any good. Unfortunately some areas of the country are just like this now and it's a waiting game until it picks up again.

P.S. Sorry ITC - I have to "spread it around" before I can rep you again.

We just moved from the suburbs of Chicago and the situation there is very similar as well. Somehow, we managed to sell our house quickly, but I don't think it had much to do with price. We just happened to have the right buyer come along at the right time. We priced to sell (took a loss on a house we had owned for 7 years), neutralized the house, and had the home professionally staged, but there were several others homes in our neighborhood in the same price range (some a little more, some a little less) that had done the same thing. Our Illinois neighborhood was a hot neighborhood to be in, but despite the major drop in prices over the last couple of years, it was hard to even give the houses away. No buyers! I'm still amazed that we were able to sell. I had been preparing myself for a very long selling process...like a couple of years.

[TexasGirl@Heart]

I feel for the OP! This is the reason I'm still living in Pittsburgh, rather than Austin. I cannot move there without selling here first....my job pays well, but not well enough to carry two mortgages or mortgage + rent. I plan on sticking it out here for several more years and then try to sell once I see the economy starting to improve.

[eileenkeeney]

I was lucky.
I already had the Oregon house paid off when I got told I had to move to Austin.
It just keeps dropping in value more and more.

I have co-workers/friends who are not so lucky. No luck selling, and they still have to pay living costs here (renting small apartments).

But from the standpoint of the employer, the tax breaks in one area expired, and this area had tax breaks to offer.

[Dr.Mom]

Originally Posted by eileenkeeney

I was lucky.

But from the standpoint of the employer, the tax breaks in one area expired, and this area had tax breaks to offer.

So what happens when the tax breaks in Austin end? Will you have to relocate again?

[eileenkeeney]

Originally Posted by Dr.Mom

So what happens when the tax breaks in Austin end? Will you have to relocate again?

Hopefully back to Oregon, to retire :-).

[Dr.Mom]

Originally Posted by eileenkeeney

Hopefully back to Oregon, to retire :-).

That's not bad then! Unfortunately I've seen many families bounced across the country and back for corporate transfers. With this economy and the general inability of people to sell homes quickly, I don't know that it's happening much anymore. Anyway, I hope that you enjoy your time in Austin while you're there.

[loves2read]

We own home in the DFW area that has mortgage we could afford to pay off--we bought newer home not far away almost two years ago--right before the market cratered--

the original house we owned/lived in for 20+yrs--it needed remodeling--we knew that -- and we considered doing that and not moving but we wanted a different floorplan and really could not do that with the original house...
we let it sit for over 8 mo waiting to see what would happen with the economy--then had AC leak that created water damage--so we started the reno--
about the time the reno was done--when the market had started to pick up and there was the govt incentive money for new buyers--our son told us he was getting divorce (no kids thankfully) and he wanted to move into our old house-
My husband said OK--eventhough for many reason I did not think it was good for our son or us--but he did...
he paid half the market rent and has two cats that hopefully have been using their litter boxes and not damaging the new carpet too much--
Now our son says he can't afford to pay even the reduced rent we are asking and he is probably going to move-in with friend of his--
We are going to be left with cleaning up the house again and then trying to put it on market with slow sales and no govt incentives...
we would likely have broken even if we had put it on market last year this time--maybe made a little profit (depending on if we could have sold-by-owner) but not now--
the only good thing in our favor is that we did do the renovations and the house does look updated compared to most homes in our area that are on MLS--they have wallpaper and dated appearance--
but homes are just not selling and everyone knows the winter is worse time to try to sell home...

I am frustrated that my husband and son would not consider some of the options/reasons why his moving in here was not good for either side--
and I totally sympathize with people who are forced to move across country to follow a job in this economy--with a company that does not give a flying f for what it does to the employees when it makes a huge move like that--
it is too bad that realtors are not working on house swaps for people in this situation--
there must be many many people who MIGHT be able to benefit from doing something like that only there is no organized way to help them...

[loves2read]

and I totally agree that for 99% of the people in similar situations--buying a home just because you don't want to live in an apt is just not SMART--I don't care where you are living == unless you are so wealthy that you don't care what happens in the future

if you want to "waste" money--put more into a rental home and keep your options open...

[Momof3OK]

We are in a similar situation. Me and the kids stayed behind to sell house. Husband rented a small apartment here in Austin. For 6months no buyers and few lookers. We lowered our price 4 times on the house put in new carpet and granite counter tops in hopes of selling quickly. Nothing. The house is now listed for less than we paid for it 3 years ago. After 6 months we were tired of being apart. We found a great deal on a bank owned home down here in Austin. The house is about 1/2 the size of our other house so we had to do some adjusting. Its still bigger than any apartment. The up side is that the house payment turned out to be less than the rent on the apartment my husband was leasing and it allowed us to all be together and get kids in school here. We figure we can ride out market for about another year before things get really tight for us making 2 house payments. We hope that the market is coming back up and that we can sell the other house in the next year. Once it sells than we can start looking for a larger home that fits our wishes/needs better or improve the smaller house to fit us. We also had to move or risk losing the relocation moving reimbursement the new company offered us to move our stuff. We now jokingly refer to the old house we are still trying to sell as the vacation home. We really need the other house to sell soon.

[G Grasshopper]

Originally Posted by Momof3OK

We are in a similar situation. Me and the kids stayed behind to sell house. Husband rented a small apartment here in Austin. For 6months no buyers and few lookers. We lowered our price 4 times on the house put in new carpet and granite counter tops in hopes of selling quickly. Nothing. The house is now listed for less than we paid for it 3 years ago. After 6 months we were tired of being apart. We found a great deal on a bank owned home down here in Austin. The house is about 1/2 the size of our other house so we had to do some adjusting. Its still bigger than any apartment. The up side is that the house payment turned out to be less than the rent on the apartment my husband was leasing and it allowed us to all be together and get kids in school here. We figure we can ride out market for about another year before things get really tight for us making 2 house payments. We hope that the market is coming back up and that we can sell the other house in the next year. Once it sells than we can start looking for a larger home that fits our wishes/needs better or improve the smaller house to fit us. We also had to move or risk losing the relocation moving reimbursement the new company offered us to move our stuff. We now jokingly refer to the old house we are still trying to sell as the vacation home. We really need the other house to sell soon.

Sounds like you did just what we are thinking of doing. Talked to our realtor last night. She said that even her buying clients who are qualified to buy just won't put "pen to paper." She said they seem afraid that house prices will go down further and they will end up under water. Its the lack of confidence in the general economy, I guess. Looks like we have a "vacation home" too.