Pricing is a big factor in whether any item -- whether a sofa or a home -- will sell. (Photo: iStockphoto)
When it comes to selling a home, one of the biggest mistakes is pricing it incorrectly.
That’s especially a problem these days, as home prices drop and home sellers compete for a relatively small pool of interested home buyers.
It especially can be tough to price your home when you purchased it for more than what it can likely sell for today.
That fact was brought home recently in a New York Times article on the subject. The story starts out with a look at a Philadelphia homeowner who owns a penthouse in the city with amazing views. However, he came to the realization that however wonderful his place may be, he’ll have to lower his price to reflect current market conditions in order to sell. “It is such a special place, but now I realize that doesn’t matter during a recession,” he says in the article. Ouch -- that's a hard lesson.
Unfortunately, selling in today’s market often means getting less for a home than one had hoped.
The "New York Times" offers these tips on how to sell at the right price -- one that’s fair enough to attract buyers and gets the best price possible for the seller:
1. Check your local tax assessor’s or county clerk’s office for recent selling prices for homes like yours. Often, this information can be found on these offices’ websites.
2. Take the prices that you find with a grain of salt. For instance, a home may have been sold to a relative for less than its full market price.
3. Look at home sales from the last two to three months. Today’s market is in flux, so sales figures from six months ago might not have relevance today. Some experts even recommended only looking at sales figures that are no older than six weeks.
4. Look at the prices of homes on the market that are similar to yours -- you will be competing against these homes to attract buyers.
5. Use online sites like Cyberhomes.com to look up your home’s value.
6. Visit open houses to get a true sense of how other homes on the market stack up against yours.
Hopefully, this kind of research will help you to pinpoint an asking price that will lure in buyers and get the most possible for your home. —Lauren Baier Kim