Wearing My Seller Hat
Posted Mar 26, 2008 @ 4:01 pm, Viewed by 233 Visitors, Read 263 Times.The best way to put yourself in the shoes of one of your sellers is to actually become one. If I was to take my own good advice, I would NOT sell this property right now - but hold on to it and rent it until the market improves. But we really don't want to rent it, it's a BRAND NEW HOME. New homes seem to have much more value than used homes. Well, at least that's what we thought... We bought the lot long enough ago with plans of building and making a profit and ideally it should have worked out. But, complications and delays put us far behind schedule and here we are trying to sell the house at cost just to get out from under it. But, quite frankly, cost just isn't going to do it right now. The home was on the market all during construction at $189,900 -- break even point and guess what - not one call, inquiry, or double take on a drive by. So, after taking a sharpened pencil and a good stiff drink we lowered the price by $20,000.
Hey, what can you do - it's the market today. If you want to sell, you must price accordingly. While price is the most important aspect there are other things to be concerned with as well and that's presentation, upgrades, and extras. Once the builders are out of there with the punch list items, we plan to clean it until it shines and do a little painting and decorating. We upgraded the landscaping and put in a sprinkler system to achieve a better curb appeal and we added hurricane shutters, garage door opener, a microwave and refrigerator. Plus, we installed all the window blinds and bought upgraded lighting. We usually decorate the kitchen and bathrooms of all of our vacant homes. This really does make a difference with the pictures in the MLS and it helps the buyers visualize better.
I can really sympathize with my seller's right now. Many of them need to sell and can't lower the price for different reasons. At least we were fortunate enough to be able to lower it. We will see what happens. I really doubt we will lower it more - renting it is still an option and it is the advice I usually give to sellers right now.
Robert Lipply heads up the team "Lipply Real Estate" under Remax Realtec of Palm Harbor. Serving the entire Tampa Bay area, our team can help you with any Tampa Bay Real Estate interest. The Lipply Real Estate team ranks in the top 100 real estate team in Florida and in the top ten in the Pinellas Suncoast region. We have the expertise to guide you through the process of homeownership. Whether you are buying or selling a home, we hope you contact us!
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I still believe that real estate is a good investment but long term of course and now more than ever. We have made other real estate investments both long and short term that have paid off nicely but now is certainly not the time for any short term gains. I would never let the listing go that long, losing all that monthly income. We will give it a little time possibly into the summer and see if we can sell it, then if not we will look for a good tenant for a few years. Have to give it a good shot once we get the pictures right and the marketing. Wish me luck!
I meant to wish you luck in my last comment and I wish we could edit our comments! The problem I've seen with renting out new construction is that when it goes back on market it just isn't new any longer and in my area the values have been dropping which means a possible loss if it does sell or simply renting it out long-term. We had two (joined by a 3rd recently) new upscale condo complexes going up around our refurbished train station going to downtown Chicago. Investors flocked to the first two developments and have since become reluctant landlords (they had no intentions of being landlords, they bought at pre-construction prices and were interested in flipping). A year later they're calling all agents asking us to actually sit down with them (they were already listed) like a broker's open meeting. I told the guy I talked to that I knew the building and will show the units if I have a buyer for them. The problem was, these upscale condos cost more than the average sale price of a single family residence in the village.
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I just closed on a listing (not mine) of a brand new home that has sat empty for 2 years. The sellers finally got an offer (the only one that I know of - I didn't have the listing the entire 2 years) and they went as low as they could afford to. They ended up bringing around $10,000 or so to the closing. They were glad just to get rid of it. In their case, I think they were brand new "contractors" hoping to make a nice profit. Instead they learned a tough lesson.