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Trapped in housing market, good real estate agent, problems selling home requires patience, competitively priced homes, active market, marketing and home exposure
Our house has been on the market since May. I truely feel almost imprisoned. It just struck me that I've never been in a situation like this where our choices are so limited by the whims and circumstances of others. A realtor in town told me that nobody around here has any money. Surely, someone still does?
It used to be that we decided to move, someone was there to buy our house (in 2 days and in 2 weeks), and off we went to where ever we wanted. This is hard to get used to, but I hear there are a lot of people in the same boat.
I'm lucky I don't have to move in a hurry, but I want to get it over with.
Know how you feel. BUT, it WILL happen. THis is just a crappy market. We too have been on since May and I used to stress. But, I prayed and I know it will happen...just not in my time (which is YESTERDAY, by the way, lol!)
Hang in there. I am now thinking about it this way. THere are 3 buckets. Bucket one you have TOTAL control over. Bucket two you can influence a little. Bucket three you have NO CONTROL over what-so-ever. Selling a home is between bucket 2 and three (in my opinion) You can influence it with staging, pricing right, and having the right agent but then it goes to buclet three and you just have to sit and wait. Don't worry, someone will eventually make it bucket one for all of us sellers! (That is when we become buyers!)
Hang in there, your house will sell. As you stated, the silver lining is that you're not in a position where you HAVE to sell right now. Just be sure you keep your house priced competitively and that your agent continues actively marketing your home.
It's a hard time for everyone right now!! This will be my 4th home (after this one sells)
And I don't remember times being this tough. Between the staging, stainless steel, Pergo flooring, HGTV, I think us sellers are ready for the LOONEY BIN!!
I would love to open a retreat for us home sellers, the seller can get away for a week and be pampered, while I have my service clean, host open house with food and drink, and stage your home for you, while you are queen for a week, then you go back to the stress, hair pulling, nail biting, gray haired moments of the realities of selling a home!! And thanks to HGTV....all this while PRETENDING to be OH SOO PERFECT!!
Do I sound STRESSED!! http://bestsmileys.com/frustrated/7.gif (broken link) http://bestsmileys.com/silly/13.gif (broken link)
Last edited by kickinbackfl; 10-21-2007 at 07:11 PM..
And I don't remember times being this tough. Between the staging, stainless steel, Pergo flooring, HGTV, I think us sellers are ready for the LOONEY BIN!!
Make sure your agent is investing in internet exposure on your home. Also, check out the flyers,signs,ads,ect for your home. Are lenders assisting in the sell? Use all your options
Trapped, angry, tired of cleaning, sick of my life being on hold. Does that just about cover the bases? Oh, and scared too because I'm losing money faster than I can make it. Yeah, I'm right there with you. I worked at a job I disliked for more than 30 years so I could retire. Now this dam house is keeping me stuck in this arctic wasteland. My second summer on the market has come to an end. 6 months of Winter are around the corner.
I think it's just the truth that quite a few of us will be just stuck for the next 4 years or so. Maybe more. The collapse of the housing market isn't the realtor's fault. I do however, wish they would drop all the pretense that everything will work out OK for the sellers. I also wish they could deliver a price that would sell. I keep lowering the price too late. If the realtor had been up front and told me the market was collapsing and I needed to sell now at ANY price, it would have been a done deal. Now it's too late. I've lost about 100K. Much more and I won't be able to retire. First it was the thieving CEO who stole my retirement account and now it's the housing market. I had enough wiggle room to accomodate either one of these events but not both of them.
I've always been a pretty moral person and I've never done anything dishonest. That's not working anymore. Maybe it's time to get that second mortgage for every possible cent and just walk away? Can't help but think about it. One more repoed house won't make any difference. If you watched CNN this weekend you learned they can't even auction off houses here. Sad.
Last edited by yellowsnow; 10-22-2007 at 03:30 AM..
Reason: spelling
yep, I know where you are. In the past year we have tried to sell two houses ; sold nothing, and now we will be trying to sell another one. Luckily we didnt have to sell ; we decided to move out of state but when our primary home didnt sell, we were able to change gears. But its hard. One puts their whole lives on hold while we try to sell.
OUr major question these days is do we rent out again or do we leave the house vacant in the hopes of selling quickly.
Its atough choice.
d
Our house has been on the market since May. I truely feel almost imprisoned. It just struck me that I've never been in a situation like this where our choices are so limited by the whims and circumstances of others. A realtor in town told me that nobody around here has any money. Surely, someone still does?
It used to be that we decided to move, someone was there to buy our house (in 2 days and in 2 weeks), and off we went to where ever we wanted. This is hard to get used to, but I hear there are a lot of people in the same boat.
We've been on since May also. Our house is move in ready. We should have been one of the 1st to sell, but I feel that the old agent made a huge mistake, listed our house age wrong. Now the market is slow. People are afraid to buy because they think prices will be drastically lower in the spring. They don't realize that not every market had a huge increase, so it won't need a huge price correction.
Quote:
Originally Posted by yellowsnow
Now this dam house is keeping me stuck in this arctic wasteland. My second summer on the market has come to an end. 6 months of Winter are around the corner.
Sorry. Hopefully something will happen for you. What state are you in?
I think it's just the truth that quite a few of us will be just stuck for the next 4 years or so. Maybe more. The collapse of the housing market isn't the realtor's fault. I do however, wish they would drop all the pretense that everything will work out OK for the sellers. I also wish they could deliver a price that would sell. I keep lowering the price too late. If the realtor had been up front and told me the market was collapsing and I needed to sell now at ANY price, it would have been a done deal. Now it's too late.
.
That's what I don't get about alot of realtors that I've talked too. The inability to forecast the market. When you have rapidly rising inventory and slowing sales, many, many realtors I've seen have priced homes way to high hoping to get that miracle (sucker) buyer out there rather than banking on being ahead of the market and having a better chance at making a sale.
There's still so much talk of markets here that are "balanced" or "pricing is stable" when reality shows that not to be the case. I just don't get it. Is it some realtors are afraid to admit the obvious or is something instilled by the NAR to limit the amount of bad news out there....?
We've been on since May as well and I'm finally at the point where while I pray it sells (and I think it will) I'm resigned that it may not happen this winter and have made peace with that. I was stressing so bad it wasn't funny but the other day I just sat down and said to myself, "ok, it'll happen when it happens and not any sooner and stressing won't help in fact it could kill me before we are able to sell.
The interesting thing that has happened from this delay is I got to talk to my other half about runing out and buying another house when we sell this one. She is really big on buying a new one but I'm leaning more and more to just renting for a year and socking the 50k down payment into more investments. This will give us time to look around and see where we really want to buy (or if) and to see how the market is going to shake out, so this delay could have been a good thing.
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