Well, here goes. The start to our trek North to Maine, our new home-state. (Hartford: home inspector, closing)

[maineguy8888]

Google street view shows that your house is probably the nicest one on the block....that’s a problem.

[carnivalday]

Google street view...is that a shared driveway? How does that work. Is your yours, or your neighbors?

[OutdoorLover]

Originally Posted by Cuffler

Yep, two full bathrooms with flushers, too! LOL

Well, here it is mid July and still no offers. We can't seem to generate any visitors in any of our attempts at open houses, either. It would appear, from our research, that smaller homes are selling but none of the older homes are, regardless of condition. Mine is turn-key condition, ready to go. There will always be maintenance on any home, of course, but nothing out of the ordinary. To say we are frustrated is an understatement. Our current realtor's contract is up in early September. We're holding out hope that the house will sell before then but have to make contingencies in the meantime. We also have dropped the price one more time to our bottom line: $225,000. You can't find anything comparable for that cost for the square feet being offered, especially a huge master suite with an ensuite attached. It is really mind boggling.

Mom is now also requiring 24/7 help so right now we're all taking shifts when we can but we are also making arrangements for professional help. There's enough money for a solid year of full week help as long as we all fill in the gaps from time to time. It'll be a lot of work but Mom's comfort is most important. I'm at her kitchen table as I type this and will be here for the day with a break later this afternoon when her regular assistant will be here for a few hours. At least she's not having to be in a nursing home!

We have made our plans for 10 days in September for either Seawall or Schoodic Point this year hoping to also be looking at properties in addition to just enjoying Maine in September.....your best month, I'm convinced. Hold out some hope that we meet a nice family who needs the space between now and then! More to come.

I can't believe it's just sitting there at $225K. Big place, finely built and looks in very good shape. Haven't heard figures lately, but I imagine that's considerably less than the average home price these days, and that's not an average house. In my town - I shudder to think of what that would cost. Is the job market slow around there? Hope your luck changes with the sale, man.

[JimG2]

The problem that can't be overcome is that the buyer at that price point are the people fleeing Connecticut

[angelo129]

Originally Posted by JimG2

The problem that can't be overcome is that the buyer at that price point are the people fleeing Connecticut

I looked at the house on Zillow, and it's really lovely (though, personally, I would have preferred it without the vast expanses of white wall). I also looked at the property taxes, and I'd think that may be some of the reason why people are fleeing Connecticut. It's sad because i'm sure that when the OP bought the house, the property taxes were orders of magnitude less than they are now.

[svband76]

Originally Posted by angelo129

I looked at the house on Zillow, and it's really lovely (though, personally, I would have preferred it without the vast expanses of white wall). I also looked at the property taxes, and I'd think that may be some of the reason why people are fleeing Connecticut. It's sad because i'm sure that when the OP bought the house, the property taxes were orders of magnitude less than they are now.

$550 a month taxes, if it's accurate, is steep. Heck there are properties in maine where that's your annual amount.

[WhoFanMe]

It's easy to bash the real estate agent and the industry when a house doesn't sell and many are doing that quite well here. I've followed this thread through your first agent and now this one and can recall how excited you were to hire this one. I'm not in your market, nor are any well wishing posters on this thread, none of us are qualified to tell you why the house isn't selling. My guess is there is something that is pushing buyers to other homes and not yours and I hope your agent is updating you with those homes so that you can see what is selling in your price range. I believe you said that you had a certain bottom line, but the buyer isn't concerned about that, they will only be willing to make a purchase decision when they see value. It's quite clear that buyers aren't seeing the value in your home as it's presented. That's something that you and your agent, as a team, need to fix and that could involve taking it off the market for awhile and re-introducing it. I wish you the best.

[Cuffler]

We've come to the end of our second realtor's contract as or 07/31. We're going to lay low for the month of August while we recoup and also tend to my wife's mother who is failing. In September we'll resume our search for a buyer but are unsure how how or who we will enlist to help us.

What we are perplexed about is the utter lack of any interest of ANY realtor currently showing homes to potential buyers in our area. They can sell someone else's listing as the buyer's agent and will get paid. Why, then, don't they check out some of the more attractively priced homes where you get a bigger bang for your buck? In a full year we've had maybe 6 "lookers". That's it and they were from our listing agent, zero from any other agency. I've spoken to so many people in the area about this issue without much of an answer. I can handle criticism and would gladly address any issue that anyone thought might be an obstruction to a sale. Regarding the shared driveway, in this part of town they are not rare at all. This house and the smaller house next door belonged to the same family and they used a common driveway to get to a two-carriage/two-horse barn further back. Over the years another family now owns the other home (my brother and sister-in-law coincidentally) and it's never been an issue since 1888. There is a codicil in the deed addressing that. The properties here are called "flag properties" which are about 100' wide but 400' deep.

Property taxes.......don't get me started. IT's one of the driving forces to leave Connecticut because we are literally taxed on virtually everything and now they're debating if we need to install 60 gantries across our highways to collect tolls. They are a tax hungry democrat legislature and don't know how to say no to any new taxes. I understand that this may be another detriment to selling but other homes are selling in the area for more money.

I know......a lot of you are saying that there has to be another shoe to drop here. There isn't. This is just an older home but it is turn-key, period. Nothing needs to be done to walk in and thrive here. I believe that this is a case of poor salemanship by the very young realtors who like to pick low-hanging fruit. I've asked them directly why they don't suggest other homes to their potential buyers and the one common answer I got back was "because they will leave me if I show them homes are are not interested in". Wow.

So, we continue. I can't thank you all enough for allowing me to lean on your collective shoulders from time to time. I read each of your thoughtful posts carefully and have gleaned ideas and taken many of your suggestions. I've been told by many that it'll just take that one special family looking for a larger home to raise their family in, just like we did with our 3 kids. That's like saying you find the thing you're looking for in the last place you look! Now it's just a matter of time when that family will come along....hopefully soon!

[carnivalday]

There has to have been feedback from the agents. These are the same agents who told you 6 months ago that they could sell it in a month. The house hasnt changed since then. I think the agents are right in that they cant show houses if people arent interested; its a waste of time for everyone. But then WHY arent they interested? What is keeping people even coming to look at it? As you said, its move in ready, pristine. So what is it?

Head scratcher for sure.

[slyfox2]

When we sold our home in PA, I did all the leg work. I made up a brochure for the house, and then I sent it to every realtor in the area, every two weeks. I posted it in every selling place like Craigslist I could find, including places like NYC where boomers might want to retire to rural PA.

I lowered the price to the absolute minimum that we needed to have to make the move to Maine.

All of this didn’t work until I used the Catholic Ritual and burying a statue of St Joseph and the baby Jesus upside down in the front yard, and then I said the intense prayer with heartfelt belief twice a day and before any expected visit. After no visits from early July to September 1, within 24 hours after I started the ritual, I started having visits, and only 2 weeks later I was in contract.

You cannot expect any realtor to sell your house unless you are willing to pay them $1000’s under the table.