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Our house is on the market and I just need to vent about some of the buyers and realtors who come through for showings. Sadly, this is not a one-time occurrence.
Our house is listed as having 1.5 bathrooms. Apparently this is a deal-breaker for a lot of people because they just cannot get by with 1.5 bathrooms. That's fine. We realize our home will not appeal to a number of buyers because of this.
This is what gets to me: the listing CLEARLY states the house has 1.5 bathrooms, yet buyers come through and afterwards the feedback I frequently get from realtors is "they love the house, but there aren't enough bathrooms".
Well, if they need more than 1.5 bathrooms, why are they even going to look at a house with 1.5 bathrooms? Do they just like window shopping and wasting people's time? And why is the realtor bringing them to see a house with 1.5 bathrooms if they know their client needs more bathrooms than that?
The reason this aggravates us so much is that we spend about 2 hours prep time for every showing, making the house an immaculate and beautifully-staged showplace (HGTV would be proud!), so time wasters like this drive us absolutely crazy.
Here's another example of the time wasting we deal with. A realtor called me telling me she has a very interested buyer who wants to see the house. In fact, she told me, this prospective buyer actually put an offer in on the house 5 years ago when we bought it, but our offer had already been accepted and she was too late. Sounds like a good prospect, right? I mean what better prospect than someone who actually tried to BUY the house before?
So after the showing, I call the realtor for feedback and she tells me, "she absolutely LOVES the house, but it's at the top of her price range and the windows need to be replaced."
Now tell me how this is not wasting our time. First of all, the price is clearly listed. If it's at the very top of her price range, she should realize she'll be stretching herself too thin since most buyers like to make SOME changes to a home when they move in (esp. if a home is 80 years old, which ours is).
Secondly, she almost bought the house 5 years ago, so I assume she knows the windows are old. Nowhere in our listing (which has a very long, detailed description outlining all features and upgrades, as well as a good number of photographs) do we state the windows have been replaced.
Ugh! These people make me crazy. Honestly, I am happy to do all the prep work for serious buyers and realtors who have consideration for people's time, but these time-wasting window shoppers enfuriate me.
Sassy, have your agent screen these out with the buyer agent when setting up the showing. While nobody likes to turn away showings, if they're not pre-approved or looking for features that don't exist they're wasting everybody's time.
I've had that a few times too. Often though I think it's people usually just starting to look and haven't really communicated with their agent on what they want. Or maybe their agent feels the home offers a lot of other things they might would over look some of the negatives.
Of course it doesn't take me two hours did get my house ready so the time wasters don't really bother me. it's just me in the house so about 20 minutes and the morning and maybe 30 minutes at night my house is pretty much show ready all the time. I'm sure it's much different if you have pets or kids.
It seems to me, correct me if I'm wrong, that you're showing the house yourself - right?
In the case of the buyer who says the home is at the top of her range - I think the feedback actually sounds positive. If the seller is speaking to the buyer's agent one on one, and the buyer might be actually considering the house, why would the agent show all her cards? By telling you the house is essentially overpriced and listing a negative about it, she may be setting the groundwork for an offer - and to be able to justify it.
Or I could be totally off base.
In the 1 1/2 bathroom situation ... there may be nothing negative about your home and the agent may be grasping at straws at SOMETHING to say. I can't tell you the amount of homes that I've shown where there is nothing wrong with the home, the neighborhood, the price ... it's just not a good fit.
Sometimes a buyer knows it's the "one" - or it's not - instinctively. Without a good reason to back it up.
Is it possible that some buyers can only afford a home with 1.5 baths, despite that they want more, or .....
Is it possible that your home is not positioned to adequately reflect that the number of baths compared to the competition?
Is sounds like you are either FSBO or perhaps listed with a Flat Fee Guy. If so, it is imperative that you really, really know your competition. What are comparable homes currently closing at in your area? Has anything else gone under contract, since you have been for sale? How does your place measure up to the competition? What's the market doing in your area? If it's depreciating, the longer you remain amongst the unsolds, the more likely the gap between your original ask and your closing price. Can you afford this? What happens if you do not sell, this season? Can you stay put?
Thanks for your replies - you've made soon good points.
We are listed via a flat fee MLS listing agent, so we don't really have an agent, per se, other than the fact that the company lists us on the MLS. That's the only service we are paying for. We use a combo lock on our door, so if a buyer has a realtor, the realtor lets themself in and does the showing (we are not there). If a buyer comes without a realtor, we do the showing.
But you have given me a good idea. Perhaps I can do a little screening on the phone with the realtors who call to ask them if their clients are aware the house has 1.5 bathrooms (since that seems to be the biggest sticking point). Try to feel them out a little before scheduling the showing.
Chuckity, it would be fine with me if someone said, "the house is really nice, just doesn't feel like 'the one' for the buyer", I would totally understand that. I'd rather hear that than "there aren't enough bathrooms" when we've listed how many bathrooms there are!
Middle-aged mom, we met with 3 realtors prior to listing our house and we set our price based on the average of their suggestions, and after carefully reviewing the comps. We're pretty confident it's competitively priced and we are certainly getting a lot of calls for showing. I think we've had about 15 in the past month.
We're pretty confident it's competitively priced and we are certainly getting a lot of calls for showing. I think we've had about 15 in the past month.
To Sassygirl18, most buyers are aware that they can't get everything they want and especially for first time buyers, it's a process to work out which things you can live with and which you absolutely can not. During our search, we definitely looked at a number of houses which didn't fit all the criteria (for us it was the size and layout of the kitchen). What we were looking for is the POSSIBILITY of future upgrades, i.e. we knew the kitchen wasn't going to be what we wanted, but we wanted to know if there was room to make it what we wanted down the line.
Maybe your buyers were looking to see if they can live with the 1.5 bathrooms, i.e. they are really large bathrooms that can be shared more comfortablly, or that there's room and ease to add a bathroom later on, etc.
Last edited by silverneedle; 05-14-2009 at 01:01 PM..
I completely understand the frustration. Once I had a very nice cape that I lived in before making a rental. As the place apprciated I eventually listed it. It had 3 legal bedrooms, two on the upper level and third on the main level (as well as space in the basement that could be pressed into service for a sleeping area in a pinch). Shocking how many people would come through with a "if only all three bedrms were upstairs...". I mean I had the darned video tour online, the photos, the complete and accurate MLS info, a full service real estate agent listing it and they'd still not get that it was tens of thousands less BEAUSE I could not price higher due to the bedroom layout???
You learn to shrug a lot...
If you are not getting second showings you really need to evaluate your pricing and your competition. I would be shocked in not one of those 15 folks have made on offfer on some other place, and with a full service agent you MIGHT be able to figure why that was not yours...
BTW, what sort of commision are you willing to share with buyer's agents? Is that working against you? Something to think about.
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