Pricing your home to sell

Now that you have prepaired your home to sell, you need to bring in a professional to tell you what it will sell for in the crazy housing market in Bothell (or anywhere around the Puget Sound area for that matter). Your home will be worth what the market thinks it is worth; not what you want it to be worth, not what you owe on it, not what your mother thinks it should be worth, not what Zillow (or any other internet site says); only the market will tell you the exact price your home is worth for its condition, size, location and style. An experienced real estate agent who has studied your local market and has the skills to analyze the sales comparables that are on the market or have sold in the past few months can give you a really good idea, but even they will not be able to tell you the exact price these days. For the past 4 years the market pricing has been dropping every month, then when we hit 2012 something strange happened...we ran out of inventory. The demand is still there, but there are fewer houses on the market that at any time in the past 30+ years so we are seeing multiple offers and houses on the market for HOURS instead of months. I saw a new listing in Kirkland the other day only an hour after it was listed on the MLS at about 10pm. I did some comps and figured it was over priced by about $30,000 at $400,000, but it fit what my clients were looking for so the next day when my buyer got off work we went to see it. They liked it so i called the listing agent about putting in an offer and was told there were 3 offers on it already and 2 more coming in. Two were all cash with the inspection waived and 2 others had escilation clauses raising the already high price even farther. I asked the agent how he came up with the price since the comparables were so much lower. He said that he figured it was about $20k high, and he figured it would sell in a few weeks. He was totally shocked by all the offers on the first day it was available. Another in Bothell was very similar. Priced at $390k it needed some updating, had a dumpy back yard with medium large power lines just past the back fence. It took a little longer to sell, but had 2 offers in 2 days. To show that price really matters, a split in Bothell that was priced at $330k was judged by the market to be way over priced and has not had much of any activity in 60 days and they are now starting to drop the price. Everything about your house affects the price. If it is a split level that lowers the value, a rambler increases the value. Updated kitchens will help you get the best price for your home while all of the other things i told you about in previous postings will affect the price in a lesser way. Find a Realtor you trust and who has the experience in YOUR neighborhood to get the ball rolling and start packing.

6 Worst Remodels When Selling Your Home

Here is a good article about the 6 worst remodels when selling your home from Yahoo! Finance. The thing to remember is to not go overboard with all sort of high end bling that you may love, but the typical home buyer will just think is a waste of space or money. One recent example they do not list in this article is an in-ground, outdoor pool in Bothell (or anywhere in the Puget Sound region for that matter). I saw one at a house yesterday that took up almost the whole back yard and cost over $30,000 that the seller thought was a valuable feature and reflected that in their asking price. As soon as my buyers saw the pool, all they could think about was the liability of keeping the neighbor kids (and their own) safe, plus the expense of heating all that water in our cool weather. They would not even look at the rest of the house and we left. Another house i saw a few months ago had a custom hot-tub/steam room in the basement. It must have been at least $15,000 to build and all my buyers wanted to know was how much it would cost to get rid of it. So if you are thinking of selling in the near future, be sure your updates are not complete remodels and that you think of the monitary return on your investment not how much you would enjoy that expensive 'feature'. If you are thinking of selling your home (or any type of real estate in the Puget Sound Region for that matter) please call me at 206-214-5408 so we can discuss how you can get the most money when selling your property.