You’ve decided to sell your Jacksonville real estate for whatever reasons. If you’re like most folks I’ve met you probably have said to yourself and anyone who’ll listen, ‘I’m not going to just give it away’.
Now anyone who knows my dad knows that he kept that house in top condition through the years. When he added on to make it larger and give mom a nice size kitchen to do her magic with the cooking, he did it right. He kept it freshly painted every 4-5 years and always made needed repairs before they got out of hand. In his mind, this house was a treasure and whoever bought it should consider themselves fortunate to be getting such a fine piece of real estate… and he was right. When thinking back over all he had done to nurture and maintain the house from foundation to roof, he was absolutely certain that it was worth thousands more than any other house in the neighborhood… but it wasn’t. Nope, I had to say “sorry dad but as nice as it is, your house isn’t worth any more than fair market value and the market determines what that value is from day to day.” I wish I could say that he believed me and set the price at fair market value from the get go, but like many other sellers he wanted to try to sell it for far more.
I’ll not go into the details but suffice it to say that after several months and numerous price adjustments he finally allowed us to price it at fair market value. And, EUREKA, it sold quickly and he and the buyers were delighted. That’s the good news. The bad news is that if my dad had been willing to price at fair market value when first listed, it would have sold for about $15,000 more. While he was sticking to his guns, the market continued to decline. Unfortunately, this same scenario has played out time and again all over Jacksonville the past few years. The point of this post is merely to say that if you need to sell but don’t Give us a call and we’ll help you determine fair market value based on objective market criteria so that you won’t end up “giving it away!”
We had the privilege of selling my parent’s house this past year. It was the house that my sister and I grew up in. In fact, we moved to Jacksonville and my parents bought the house in 1960. I was only 4 years old at the time so that vast majority of my memories were wrapped up in the walls of that fine old building.
want to “give it away” we can help. You won’t have to give it away but you will need to be realistic because regardless of how much you want for it or think that you “need” for it, the fact is that every house sells at market value. The quicker you price it at market value, the quicker you’ll get it sold, the higher the price you’ll receive and you’ll be able to move on with your life.
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