After 25 years of selling real estate in Rutherford County, I’ve learned the hard way what you need to think through before selling your home.
Here are the 3 things every seller should know before they put their home on the market:
What’s The Market Like?
Is it a buyer’s market? Is it a seller’s market? What are the 3-5 homes within a few miles of your home that are currently for sale and what are they selling for?
As you consider selling your home you need to figure out what it’s worth. You also need to understand what the competition looks like. Because buyers buy homes by comparison, knowing your competition and how they're positioned in the market is a huge advantage to you. It will tell you what you need to do as a seller to position your home for the most profit.
When selling a home in Rutherford County you need specific information on the local market. At John Jones Real Estate my team works hard to stay current with what is happening with Rutherford County real estate. In fact, we keep an updated real estate market watch for Rutherford County on our website. To check it out, you can go HERE.
How Should You Price Your Home?
Pricing your home correctly is everything! Especially with information being at everybody's fingertips. Buyers have access to more information than they've ever had and are educated about the value of your home.
You only have one chance to be a new listing. You only have one chance to be fresh to the market.
The most golden time you have in the market is the first few days or weeks when you’re on the market. You never have a chance to be a new listing again. So if you mess it up on pricing it can come back to haunt you.
You might think, “Well, I can just reduce it later.” But you’re not considering that the amount of time your house is on the market can affect its value.
If you hit the market too high, you get overlooked, you don't even get past the internet for showings.
In a market like we're in right now, you're better off being too low. Because that will create a kind of excitement, a ton of buyers will flock to your home. There’s a very good chance you’ll get multiple offers. When you do this, the market will find the price on your home and get it to where it probably needs to be.
There are a lot of places that you can get an estimate on what your home is worth. But I’ve got a great option for you that includes quick information combined with personal attention.
If you go to our Rutherford County Home Value Tool and enter some basic information, you’ll get an instant ballpark figure of the value of your home. But there are many other services that will give you that information.
The real value of our Home Value Tool is that in no time, you’ll receive a personal contact from the John Jones Real Estate team to personally discuss the perfect price for your home. Yes, we want to actually talk to you :)
Of course, if you’d like to skip that process and talk to me (John Jones) right away, you can call me on my personal cell. I answer the calls and I’ll walk you through the value of your home right there on the phone. My phone number is 615-300-7475.
All of these things can be corrected with a good strong Realtor who has the guts to be honest with the homeowner. There is no doubt that it’s awkward to tell homeowners some of these things but if an agent is not upfront with the seller they are only hurting them and taking money out of their pocket.
Clutter
Another thing a seller needs to know before they put the home on the market is that the market is true. The market doesn't care about trying to give you back all the money you put into your home. Buyers don't care about the goal you’ve set in your mind for the profit you want to get from your home.
Buyers don't care how much it costs to build your home today. Buyers don't care what you paid for the home. Buyers buy homes by comparison and they are going to pay you according to what they feel your home is worth to them in comparison to other homes on the market.
You've got to look at your home objectively. I always say, “Look at your home through a buyer's eyes.”You’ve got to pretend like it's not your home and that your home is competing with the other homes for sale in your area. What would you pay for your home compared to those other homes?
If you can remove yourself emotionally, and remover your biases to look at it that way, you’ll have success in the market.
BONUS TIP: Hire A Good Realtor
Another decision that benefits you when you remove emotion and bias is in which realtor to expect. Whether you choose to list your house with John Jones Real Estate or not, I beg you to think twice before you do a favor to your buddy who just got his real estate license. You can lose thousands of dollars on your deal if you choose the wrong advocate during the sales process. You can lose just as much if you try to do it yourself.
You want a realtor that's going to beat the market in days on the market. I would say by at least 20 to 30% because that tells you right there they know how to get the home priced right. It might be a little self-serving, but my team and I perform at this level regularly.
I want you to feel the difference of having a team working for you. You can get a whole team to work on selling your home at a rate that’s very comparable to the single agent you might consider.