QUAD CITIES REAL ESTATE WITH RE/MAX

SERVING THE ENTIRE IOWA AND ILLINOIS QUAD CITIES ............................................................

DAVENPORT - BETTENDORF - ROCK ISLAND - MOLINE AND SURROUNDING COMMUNITIES

TOM & CYNDEE BROWNER - CRS, ABR, GRI

BROKER OWNERS OF RE/MAX BI-STATE - SERVING IOWA & ILLINOIS

1-563-388-0008 Office - 1-563-388-0083 Fax - 1-866-388-0083 Toll Free - 1-563-570-7629 Cell - 355-1616 Home

Have a question? The answer is just a call or e-mail away. Contact us at tom&cyndee@quadcitiesrealestate.com

We know you want to sell your home for the most money, in the shortest time and with with least inconvenience. If you want serious advertising and effort from your agent, call or contact us for a FREE MARKET ANALYSIS of your present home. We are both Certified Residential Specialist by the Residential Sales Council. No obligation, of course. Call us on our private line at 570-7629 at RE/MAX BI-STATE or Contact us at tom&cyndee@quadcitiesrealestate.com - LOOKING TO BUY? Check out the services an Accredited Buyers Representative can mean to you.

Our Goal is to provide you with the most up to date information and Exemplary Service at all times. Homes are an important decision and a long term investment. When Your Money Matters, you need and deserve the most competent professional help available. We strive to always be on top of the market and to further our education's, that we may be knowledgeable to give you the best service and advice at all times.

HOW TO PRICE YOUR HOME

Most home sellers start with a Comprehensive Market Analysis. A CMA is done by Realtors to establish the most likely selling price for a property. To do this they look at the most recent sales of identical properties to yours in your neighborhood. These sales must be within the last year and it is preferred if they have occurred within the last six months. There must be three or more sales. If there have not been three sales, the Realtor will look in the closest subdivision with similar homes to yours. If this also fails, then homes that are not identical to yours, but are as close as possible will be used. CMA'S are free as part of taking your listing. Appraisals do much the same thing, but because the appraiser has taken classes and passed the State examination, his value opinions are held as being more valid. Cost of an appraisal is $250 to $300. Because of this, most home owners just use the Comprehensive Market Analysis offered by their Realtor. If there is a Buy Out Company involved, corporate sellers will use appraisers. (See CMA vs Appraisal link at bottom.)

After you have received the CMA information from the Realtor, it is still your decision as to where to price your home. Generally, you are better to price your home in the upper range of it's value, but not a lot above that. The "I will price my home real high to make room for lower offers", as a marketing tool is a myth and usually a huge mistake. Let's take a look at this mind set. Lets say you have a $140,000 home and decide to market it at $160,000 to look for a sucker or make room to come down.

First, the last eight years have been very consistent, in that the average asking price to sell price is 97% in most of our major cities. The outlying areas are 94% to 97% depending on how far from the metro and the size of the town. Now our seller has decided to market his home at 14% above the home's market value. So what happens?

Most buyers have a limit as to how high they can purchase. More people can afford lower priced homes, so our seller has eliminated many of his possible buyers from looking at his home. The next problem is that even if he finds the golden sucker, the suckers bank will demand an appraisal and the appraisal will come out with a value of $140,000 so financing will be denied unless Mr. Seller brings his price down and re-negotiates his contract with the buyer to a lower price. Next problem is that even if the buyers can afford to go up, they will detect that your home is smaller, has fewer amenities, and perhaps in a worse neighborhood than the other $160,000 homes. You will serve as a comparison to help sell your competition. As your home sits on the market, agents and the public will suspect that something is wrong with your home. It will become stigmatized. The longer a home sits on the market, the less you will net. National statistics prove this out each and every year.

Any time you put your home on the market, you are a retailer. You are in competition with every home that is priced $20,000 lower to $10,000 higher than your home. To sell, you must be the best priced, cleanest, largest, with the newest mechanicals and best decorating. People buy with their eyes. Your appeal from the curb is most important. Studies show that 80% of all buyers have made up their minds about your home before they enter the home. Worse, that if they have made up their minds that they did not like your home from the outside, you can not change that opinion, no matter how sharp your home interior is.

So you must not only price your home correctly, but must clean and if necessary paint the front door and entrance, pay attention to the landscape and make sure that the yard is free of debris, litter and toys.

Let's say your CMA came in with a suggested $100,000 asking price. The range was $96,000 to $98,000 for a selling price and homes are selling within 3% of asking price. You are facing the Christmas holidays. You are transferred and have no help from your company, what do you do? Answer price your home at $97,500 and try to stay firm. Your choice is go on without the wife and kids and pay double housing cost, telephone expenses and commute or sell the home. There are fewer buyers, those with kids have already bought to be in the new home before school started. No one wants to risk Santa missing the kids, and you need to sell. So price the home to sell. To compare favorably with your competition. Yes, you may miss getting an extra thousand or two, but what would be the cost of splitting the family or a double move?

If it is early Spring and you intend to move up, weather is nice and the economy and interest rates have remained stable over the winter, you might ask as high as $102,500 and hope appreciation has continued to move up over the winter and you expect demand to be strong. You have time, if it has not sold within thirty days, you can always reduce the price to $100,000 to get your $97,000 offer. Different times demand different strategies. However, you never want to severely overprice your home, just get the most the market will bear.

What is a home really worth? A home is worth what a ready, willing and able buyer and a motivated seller, both in complete knowledge of the market agree to. This is called an at arms agreement and is based on a negotiated price where both buyer and seller perceive value or benefit.

The only time a buyer steals a home is when they buy from their grandfather, mother or favorite aunt. Sellers like you only want green cash; as much as the market will bear. Likewise, you can not easily steal from the buyer. Banks, government agencies, appraisers and underwriters are looking out for them. With Buyer Agency, the buyer's agent will probably do a market analysis on your home, including it's selling history. Your buyer will have the same information you have on your home's value. Real Estate license law expressly prohibits your agent from holding a gun on the buyer to make him over pay for your home.

Ultimately the market will dictate what you can get. In a time of increasing interest rates, appreciation will slow or even stagnate. The best advice is to get a good CMA and price your home within the 3% of the highest price within the selling range shown. In this way you will appeal to the most possible buyers and create demand for your home. The highest price received is always when there multiple offers at the beginning of a listing period.

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