I have a friend who referred their neighbor to me.  His neighbor had been trying to sell their home for six months. His neighbor had reduced the price but they did not have many showings or offers. They let the listing expire. They called me to come out to take a look at their home. After looking at the home and searching for comparable sales in the neighborhood, I did determine the home was overpriced. Several upgrades were done to the home after they took it off the market. My suggestion to the sellers was to have the home appraised. The sellers thought the home should be around 360s to 370s. I could not come up with that number unless I used the new construction that closed nearby. There was only one sale in the neighborhood and it was over 6 months old. My recommedation was let's get the home appraised. The appraisal came in at 330k.

Something interesting I learned from this process is the appraiser would not use new construction since this home was 10 years old. Even though the new homes and this resale were all brick and very comparable, they would not use the new construction or even the ones that were 1 year old. They also looked at the active listings to see what the home would be competing against. I think in this market when you have a seller that is looking unrealistic about pricing where they should, we must encourage them to have an appraisal.