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Why doesn't my home sell even in today's "perfect market"?1-THE ASKING PRICE IS TOO HIGH. The main reason houses and
condos don't sell is they are overpriced. Prospective home buyers
become smart very fast. After a week or two of inspecting homes
for sale, they almost instantly recognize a home that is correctly
priced or one that is overpriced (or under-priced).
Experienced realty agents won't even waste their prospective
buyer's time inspecting over-priced homes. This fact greatly
limits the number of prospective buyers for an over-priced home.
If a home doesn't sell in today's low-interest-rate market within
60 days, the home is probably over-priced. It's that simple.
Market values are set based on recent comparable home sales prices
of nearly residences. That's why home sellers and their listing
agents need to keep up-to-date on actual sales prices of
comparable neighborhood homes.
When a home is listed for sale, the listing agent presented the
seller with a CMA (comparable market analysis). This form show
sellers recent sales prices of comparable homes, asking prices of
similar neighborhood homes and asking prices of recently expired
similar listings. Only after comparing CMA's from three or more
interviewed agents is a potential home seller capable of setting a
correct listing price.
2-CONDITION OF THE RESIDENCE. The majority of home buyers want to
purchase a house or condo in model home "tip-top move-in
condition." For this reason, smart home sellers paint and fix-up
their homes before exposing them to the market.
However, many home sellers don't want to fix-up their homes.
Elderly sellers are especially lax about fix-up work. But these
sellers unknowingly create incredible fix-up bargains for home
purchasers willing to tackle upgrades.
Fresh inside and outside paint, serious cleaning and repairing,
new carpeting, and minor fix-up such as new light fixtures and
fresh landscaping are usually all that is required to upgrade a
home from a fixer-upper to a model move-in condition home which
will attract droves of prospective buyers.
3-USE AN "AS IS" SALE FOR INCURABLE DEFECTS. When a home has an
incurable defect, however, fixing it up might be a waste of time
and money. For example, a house located next to a railroad track
or a noisy freeway has an incurable defect. Spending vast sums
fixing up such a home is usually wasted money.
A better approach to selling an "incurable defect home" is to
offer it for sale "as is" with a bargain asking price. "As is"
means the home seller must disclose to buyers any known defects,
such as a leaky roof, but the seller will not pay for repairs.
However, bargain hunter home buyers are often attracted by low
asking prices, which consider the incurable defects, such as a bad
floor plan or location next to the city dump.
Two additional reasons why some homes don't sell even in today's
"hot market" in most towns are:
4-LISTING AGENT DISCOURAGES THE HOME SALE. Diplomatically
speaking, some listing agents are home-sale obstacles. Without
intentionally doing so, some agents make it so difficult for a
buyer's agents to show and sell a home that those agents prefer to
sell other homes than to deal with a difficult listing agent.
To illustrate, in my community I know most realty agents either
personally or by their reputation. Many agents are outstanding and
I wouldn't hesitate to recommend them. However, when I see the
"for sale" sign of some agents, I want to knock on the front door
to let the seller know about their agent's poor reputation and why
the listing agent is likely to prevent a home sale.
Most sellers have no clue when they list their home for sale with
a bad or disliked agent. For this reason, I recommend sellers list
their house or condo for sale no longer than 90 days just in case
the listing agent is a dunce.
A closely related problem occurs when a home is listed with an
out-of-area real estate agent. Such agents usually have no
knowledge of local home sale market conditions. Out-of-area agents
often vastly over-price or under-price homes because they s! Simply save copies of pages and add the page to your navigation
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What
is the difference between "pre-qualified" and being "pre-approved."
Many first-time borrowers confuse being "pre-qualified" with
being
"pre-approved." Pre-qualification is a pretty casual process, where
a lender
tells you how much money you probably can borrow based on how much
money you
make, how much debt you already have and how much cash you have for
the down
payment.
Getting pre-approval, by contrast, is a much more rigorous process
and
involves actually applying for a loan. You typically submit tax
returns, pay
stubs and other information. The lender verifies the information and
checks
your credit. If all goes well, the lender agrees in writing to make
the
loan.
In a hot or even warm real estate market, the house hunter who is
only
pre-qualified is a cooked goose. Home sellers and their agents give
much
more weight to offers being made by buyers who already have a loan
lined up
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I
always hear about "Junk Fees" What are they? Can I avoid them?
Lenders can boost their profits by adding on a
variety of fees. Some may be
legitimate, some may be inflated and others may be pure fluff.
Lenders may
charge for "document preparation," for example, when all that
involves
typically is having a computer spit out a form. Or they may charge
$150 for
a credit check that cost them $15.
The time to challenge junk fees is not when you're about to sign the
loan
papers. Use a mortgage broker or call a number of lenders to compare
their
loans. Ask about the interest rate, the "points" charged to get that
rate
(each point is 1% of the total loan amount) and any other fees the
lender
charges. Then you can compare terms.
Once you've selected a lender, you'll be given a good-faith estimate
of
closing costs, which should include any fees being charged. Ask
about each
fee, and try to negotiate down the ones that seem excessive.
If the lender won't negotiate, "take that estimate to someone else,"
St.
James said. "I'll bet they can beat it."
Unfortunately, this doesn't absolutely guarantee you won't face junk
fees
when it comes time to sign the loan. Many borrowers complain that
they still
face higher costs than were originally estimated, and so far the
federal
government has done little to prevent the practice. You can try
challenging
junk fees at this point, but most likely you'll have to bite the
bullet and
pay the fees to get your loan.
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