Done with playing FOLLOW THE LEADER WITH realtors! (contingent, appraisal, auctions)

[bamboosmom]

Done with it. We aren't going to play the game anymore. Every seller has to see this. A realtor tells us to go lower on our selling price. Homes are being dropped to crazy prices. People are you desparate? I am tired of all the negative stuff about real estate and tired of the realtors wanting to make a quick sale. Don't give your homes away people!!! Stand up and make a difference. Keep your prices at what you listed them at unless you are in a desparate situation. Fight back! We are. I don't even care if we have to wait a gazillion days or months to get what our home is worth. We just had a friend get an appraisal and boy what a surprise that was. Its way above what these sellers are selling their homes for.
Nuff said.

[rubytue]

A house (or anything) is only worth what someone else will pay for it. Even a higher appraisal doesn't mean much if no one will pay that much for it.

[FL little foot]

I hear you.. I almost fired my realtor today. He hasn't sold a house in 9 months and is hurting financially, I told him I'm NOT lowering my price again. I'll wait. I am not that desperate. I have come to the conclusion I will leave it up to the powers above. If were meant to go, then we'll go. There's someone for every house. I've been listed since last February. Had 1 acceptable offer then they couldn't get a mortgage. So, I hear ya. I am priced right with all the comps in my area. Our problem is the phones are not ringing in the realtor's office for any house. Good Luck

[Steel Man]

Try Help-U-Sell. You should get better results at a lot smaller price (fee).

[pixieshmoo]

You have to keep a couple of things in mind. First, it doesn't matter what someone offers you for your house...if they're not going to pay cash and they need to mortgage, the bank or mortgage company will not lend them anymore than what the home appraises for. So you do need to keep within ethical limits (again, unless it's a cash buy). Secondly, I'm sure that in plenty of parts in the country real estate is slowing down. Believe me, I'm in NJ and it's really slowing down. The problem is this...once people see what other people are getting for their homes, they start plopping For Sale signs on their properties. In turn, you then get an overabundance in homes, which is how it becomes a "buyers' market". Once those homes start to sell, slowly but surely, you are now looking at more buyers than sellers, hence "sellers' market". Now, the sellers have the opportunity to go into bidding wars (again, within ethical limits) which in turn causes other people to see what they're getting for their homes...and then they put their homes up for sale and yada, yada, yada, it's a never-ending circle. Most realtors, if they're doing their job right, will not ill-advise you on the price of your home. Keep in mind it is always you who has the last say in what you ask price-wise for your home, but you are then risking asking for an outrageous price. Realtors are here to provide with a market analysis of other homes similar to yours that are up for sale, pending, and have already been sold. This is for you to use as a guideline when pricing your home. Most people stay within a decent range of these prices, however, sometimes, you do have to come down in price. Keep in mind, if you recall what you put down on your home and what you've put into it over the years, you will usually turn a good profit. Most people don't LOSE money when selling a home (I've never seen it happen and I can't imagine it happening unless you're completely ignorant), so you should always make a decent profit. However, you have to take it for what it's worth, we've been through recessions, depressions and everything else. It's a market, just like the stock market, it goes up and it comes down. You can stand your ground, however, if you're asking for more than the market is selling for right now, your house will sit there. If it sits there, than you need to understand why it is happening. On the other hand, if your realtor knows what he/she is doing, they will work with you and for and not just to "turn a profit". There are people out there who are honest workers and sympathetic to the cost of living these days. A good realtor will advise you properly and will only advise you to come down in price in decent increments. (Unless you're asking for $100K more than it's worth LOL) I'm sorry if you've had an unpleasant experience with your realtor, but maybe you should look for another one then. We're really not that bad

Keep in mind, you have the option of doing a "for sale by owner" however, should you come across someone who has a realtor, and they make an offer, you will be expected to pay out the commission anyway (unless you can make an agreement that buyer does, very rare however). So your best bet is to find a good realtor who will provide you with the proper advertising and put your mind at ease...you will not lose money on the home.

Lastly, some people are desperate, it depends on the situation, whether they are relocating or it's an estate, etc.

Hope I've helped some.

[leighbhe]

Hi

I am a realtor (own my own company because I had such terrible realtors when I bought my first home)...........anyhow, we had some local agents come and give us an estimate on our last house (just to see what they said) and one very desperate one wanted us to list for 25k under market. he wanted a quick sale. So, I know what it is like on both sides on the coin. The bottom line is this, realtors work for you, whether you are a buyer or a seller. Some sellers just need to get rid of their house, or hate having showings, or are building a new non contingent house, etc. So, as a realtor you have to listen to them and try to give them suggestions based on their need. If I had a client who could have their house on the market 6 months or a year and not be freaked out about it selling............I would listen to them.

Anyhow, I just wanted to say that you were right to stick to your guns. You know your house, if you can wait for the right offer, then that is what you should do.

Leigh

[MoMark]

Originally Posted by bamboosmom

Done with it. We aren't going to play the game anymore. Every seller has to see this. A realtor tells us to go lower on our selling price. Homes are being dropped to crazy prices. People are you desparate? I am tired of all the negative stuff about real estate and tired of the realtors wanting to make a quick sale. Don't give your homes away people!!! Stand up and make a difference. Keep your prices at what you listed them at unless you are in a desparate situation. Fight back! We are. I don't even care if we have to wait a gazillion days or months to get what our home is worth. We just had a friend get an appraisal and boy what a surprise that was. Its way above what these sellers are selling their homes for.
Nuff said.

I don't know where you are in the country, but the national market is crashing for housing, particularly in Florida, California, Nevada, Arizona, the northern Midwest, and the Eastern Seaboard. Colorado, Michigan and Indiana are vying for #1 on the Foreclosure tables. Banks and lenders are tightening qualification criteria to obtain mortgages...like the borrower having to prove income instead of having his word taken for it.. (imagine that!). The house I sold last year in Las Vegas in June is now worth less than the price my buyer paid...and I sold in two days with seven offers and desperate buyers. I read today in the Review Journal in LV that sales have declined by over 45% year over year in Las Vegas. Prices are coming down too. The fact is is that your house isn't worth what it was worth last year. That speculative bubble has burst. And you also aren't factoring in the wave of foreclosures now beginning to hit the market and bound to come in a tidal wave as people get their ARM's reset to unsustainable rates and can't pay their mortgages. Their homes will be sold by the banks by the tens of thousands at drastically reduced prices or even in auctions as the banks can't afford to hold onto them. This wave is only now beginning. They already are beginning to use a term for people who simply give up who can't afford to make their payments any longer, but also can't sell because they took out refinancing loans to extract equity to the limit when things were going up, and now owe more than they can sell the houses for (Although, second mortgages are subject to collections, you can't walk away from that debt). They just mail in their keys and it's called "Jingle Mail" If they do manage to sell the house and owe more on the mortgage then the house sells for, it's a short sale and even if they walk away, the IRS considers the difference earned income and they have to pay taxes on it. If you persist in your thinking, depending on what you owe on your mortgage versus what your house is truly worth TODAY, not last year, then you may find yourself owing more on your home than what it can sell for. Even appraisers right now are having a hard time as they can only use homes sold in the last month or so to figure comparables. The market is sliding too fast to make appraisals older than two months valid. People are afraid to buy homes because it's a pretty sure bet right now that value of the home will be less in the coming months, and no one knows where the bottom is. It's too risky to take out a mortgage in a declining market. If you get lucky and get a cash buyer or someone who can put a substantial amount down and who isn't worried about the market and is willing to pay your price regardless, then lucky you, but most people put ZERO money down now and can't afford homes without an Adjustable Rate Mortgage with super low teaser rates. Look at inventories of single family homes on the market. When I sold in Vegas, there were about 8000. Now it's approaching 24,000. Phoenix has risen from approximately 8000 to 44,000 sfh's on the market. The condo market is even worse. Your realtor is simply telling you the truth. Go ahead and stick to your belief that your house is worth a price that someone else with a comparable home got last year and you'll never sell. I read your threads, clearly you're frustrated and militantly stubborn at this stage. But that's denial and logic should tell you that if your home were priced right for the market then it would already be sold. It's not your realtor's fault the market is crashing. I'm not fond of realtors for the most part either, but be glad you have one who is being honest with you instead of feeding you what you want to hear. To ignore what is happening in the market because you don't like it is foolish I think. If you don't need to sell, then don't!!! But if you think you'll get more by holding out, I think you're in for sleepless nights and severe disappointment, particularly in the coming months.

[Mike from back east]

The bubble is deflating fast.

Here in Colorado Springs, in El Paso County, we have 6000 properties on the market, per my neighbor, a realtor, as of today. A buyer's market. And this is a big Federal town, with hefty Federal salary and contractor dollars flowing in, typically recession-proof, but we are experiencing high inventory of unsold resale and new homes.

In the DC area, it will take time to move what's on the market. Recent stats are at http://www.mris.com/reports/stats
Culpeper - 17 months farthest from DC
Fauquier - 15 months
Frederick - 13 months
Loudoun - 11 months
Prince Wm - 10 months
Spotsylvania - 8 months
Fairfax - 7 months
Alexandria - 6 months
Arlington - 5 months nearest to DC

Prices got high in 2005, and like pixieshmoo said, opportunists put their house up for sale, glutting the market with folks looking to make a killing. We sold our house in Fairfax County in May 2005 for $505k, took us four days, got four offers, all above listing price. My next-door neighbor went on the market in Spring 2006, with the identical house, in equally good shape but she went for the big kill, listed at $629k. No one bought. After 45 days she dropped to $589k, where it's been for 60 days, still no takers. Nothing was done to her house to make it worth $124k or even $84k more than our house was worth a year ago. Prices rose on desire to make a killing, but people can't afford these prices or simply won't pay outrageous prices.

There is a stat in today's Washington Post: In Fairfax County, VA, in past 5 years, housing price inflation rose at 12 times the rate of salary inflation. 12:1 People with incomes of $90k year are now eligible for housing subsidies to afford a place to live. Link is:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...082501197.html

We can blame Alan Greenspan for this. Extreme low interest rates means people can pay more for a house, without raising the total monthly payment (higher principal component of a mortgage is offset by a lower interest component, thus can afford higher priced home). Like any supply & demand scenario, two things happened: (1) People move up to a more expensive home they can now afford payments on, and (2) Home prices rose to sop up the ability of people to pay higher prices - you can afford more, I'll charge more. If Greenspan had left rates alone in 2001-2003, the housing bubble may not have happened. For 3-4 years we had artificially created prosperity. The bill is coming due. Like his father, George Bush may face his own financial debacle....remember the Resolution Funding Corporation (RFC) of Bush-41? If foreclosures and bankruptcies get out of hand, who knows what will happen.

Sellers may have to drop prices back to 2005 levels in order to sell.

s/Mike

[chiroptera]

Well, a house is worth what someone will pay for it, not what someone thinks it's worth!
But I hear you, bamboosmom. With the market in most parts of the country the way it is, you just have to be flexible and if you can afford to hold out, I say do it.
I had mine on the market for 9 months, had several showings but no good offers. It's pretty economically depressed where I am, foreclosures are double what they were last year, bankruptcies at an all time high. My realtor suggested I drop the price quite a bit. I decided not to; I'm not desparate to sell.
I paid cash for my house, I can hold out. I got it cheap because it was a foreclosure and I had the cash (barely) to buy it fast. So I figure, even if I sell for exactly what I paid for it, I'm ahead because I've no mortgage and can save.
There are houses here that have been on the market for years, because the owners won't drop their price and there's too many "better deals. "
I guess if you own the house you can ask whatever you want. BUt the consequence of holding out for top dollar is, you might have to wait a very long time.

[MoMark]

Originally Posted by travelling_paws

Well, a house is worth what someone will pay for it, not what someone thinks it's worth!
But I hear you, bamboosmom. With the market in most parts of the country the way it is, you just have to be flexible and if you can afford to hold out, I say do it.
I had mine on the market for 9 months, had several showings but no good offers. It's pretty economically depressed where I am, foreclosures are double what they were last year, bankruptcies at an all time high. My realtor suggested I drop the price quite a bit. I decided not to; I'm not desparate to sell.
I paid cash for my house, I can hold out. I got it cheap because it was a foreclosure and I had the cash (barely) to buy it fast. So I figure, even if I sell for exactly what I paid for it, I'm ahead because I've no mortgage and can save.
There are houses here that have been on the market for years, because the owners won't drop their price and there's too many "better deals. "
I guess if you own the house you can ask whatever you want. BUt the consequence of holding out for top dollar is, you might have to wait a very long time.

Your situation is different as a seller or would be seller from the vast majority of homeowners. You actually own your house and it sounds like you bought it for very little, so you could afford to sell it if you had to, regardless of economic circumstances. Most people though are mortgaged to the hilt. Few put 20% on a home anymore and mortgages have often been done by doing a 80% first, then taking a 20% second to avoid the PMI, or, people take out ARMs to get the lowest rates they can qualify for and often interest-only loans with prepayment penalties. It's a racket. That worked when prices were skyrocketing, but it causes financial disaster when prices stop rising, interest rates are reset, home prices begin falling, and the "homeowner" has no equity cushion to absorb the fall. You aren't in that situation, but most of America's homeowners are. About 33% of American homeowners actually own their homes free and clear. I'm one of them too. I paid cash for my home in January. No mortgage. I could sell if I had to below what I paid. I wouldn't like it, but I wouldn't be wiped out. I also have avoided taking out equity loans (never have done that), and I own my auto outright and have no credit card or any other debt. I stay debt free. Most people are up to their eyeballs in debt, including mortgage debt, and they are very vulnerable to a stalled or sinking housing market. There's no safety net, and those houses are hitting the market now and depressing prices. Many of the people selling now are selling because they're realizing that their ARMs are about to reset, have reset, or they fear being caught in an underwater mortgage. They can't refinance if there's no equity.