Cut to the Chase

“Chasing the market” is a discouraging cycle for home sellers. When prices are declining, it feels like a death spiral to continue cutting only to find that prices have dropped yet again.

The only way to pull out of the tailspin is to make slash the price to get ahead of the trend. That is how Floridian Yetta Levitt finally sold her large waterfront house.

Levitt was one of four winners in ForSaleByOwner.com’s “Is Your House Priced Right?” contest, which invited homeowners around the country to submit short essays explaining what they thought their houses were worth, and why.  The prize package included an appraisal to find out once and for all what the house is worth.

In retrospect, Levitt realized that her initial price drops were too modest. But she closely tracked what competing houses sold for and how banks seemed to price houses in their inventories, which unfortunately had become some of her biggest competition.  After a year on the market, Yevitt’s analysis found that the average selling price of six recently sold houses was $181 a square foot. To get ahead of the curve, she repriced her house at $151 a square foot.

It worked, and the house sold.

Pricing issues are among the most vexing for home sellers these days. To figure out the market value of your house, check out the ForSaleByOwner.com Pricing Guide.

Capitalist FSBO

Take it from the Capitalist Tool: Selling by owner is one of the smartest strategies in today’s real estate market.

The just-out issue of Forbes includes an extensive feature on the benefits of selling by owner.

Top advice from those who have successfully navigated this year’s market: say your good-byes and detach emotionally from your house. And, price it right.

"Fetching top dollar for your home requires you to do a lot of things well, and a big one is setting the right price. "Pricing is the one thing that people are most concerned about," says Tyner. "Get it right, and you can sell your house quickly and maximize what you get for it.""

We do disagree with one point in the Forbes story: that owners of very high end properties aren’t interested in selling direct. We’ve seen an increase in million-dollar-plus listings

Homeowners tell us that they’ve got property managers to show the houses and lawyers to negotiate for them. Why bother with an agent when they’ve already got staff ready and willing to handle the chores of selling? And, as Forbes well knows, many well off people get that way precisely because they closely manage their portfolios. They treat the sale of their house just as dispassionately and professionally as they do the sale of a business asset – and that means capturing a greater return by eliminating and unnecessary commission.