I have heard numerous times over the last few months from Realtors wondering why their listing hasn’t sold. The usual comment is “it’s priced right”. Well is it really? My experience has been that any property will sell if the price is right. What is the “Right Price” in today’s market? Is it “Market Value” based on the last 6 months of sales? Is it based on homes that have sold in the last 30 days? Is it the “Appraised Value”?

The “Right Price” is the price that will sell your listing in 60 to 90 days. But what is this magical number and how do we arrive it? Well in my market (Poinciana, Fl) the right price is 5% to 10% below recent comparable sales. When Realtors are searching the MLS they may have 70-100 homes that meet their Buyer’s parameters. My Seller’s property, in order to sell, needs to be in the top 5 (preferably #1) properties on the list (by price) and it needs to have a competitive or better co-broke. If you can achieve this positioning you should have no problem getting the listing sold in a short period of time. Seller’s need to know this. It is very important when pricing a house to look at the whole picture that includes active, pending, withdrawn, expired and recently sold listings. I know this is Real Estate 101 but I have met with many Seller’s recently whose listings have expired and they have never even seen a “Market Analysis”. When asked how the Realtor arrived at the listing price they say “this is what we told him/her we wanted.” They used a little known technique to price their property it goes something like this:

Now I know this may be the new math but folks it won’t get your house sold. When hiring a Realtor it is important that that Realtor provides you with a detail analysis of current market conditions and counsels you on what it will take to sell your property. They need to be 100% honest about pricing. It may not be what you want to hear but it must be what you need to hear. Then and only then can you make an informed decision on how to list your house at the “Right Price”.