I’m a pretty honest person and a terrible liar.  So when I sit down with a seller, I always respectfully and politely point out the challenges that we will face as a team to get the home sold.  It’s a different market and so no longer is it good enough to just put a sign in the yard, sell the home “as is” and hope for a good offer.  Homes need to make an exceptionally good first impression from the get go to gain enough interest from the limited buying public.

I also can do the most incredible marketing for anyone’s home to attract the right buyer, but if the product (the house) isn’t priced appropriately for it’s condition, location, curb appeal and amenities, no amount of marketing is going to get a buyer to bring my seller an offer.

However, I haven’t really worked with a seller who actively smokes in his house.  For me this is un-chartered territory.  This seller originally had it on the market “For Sale by Owner,” and I happen to preview the house for a specific buyer.  But the updating needed and the smoking eliminated this seller’s home from my buyer’s list.  However, the seller called me a few weeks later when he was ready to list his house with a Realtor because he felt, of all the agents he had met, I seemed the most genuine and trustworthy. 

I know I politely brought up the challenges to the seller about getting his home sold.  And I empathized with him, because he had recently lost his wife.  And I can’t even imagine having to be in his position.  Having to sell his home in his moment of grief.  So I tried to approach the situation cautiously, but I felt it was important he understand the challenges he faced, selling a home that has been smoked in for years.

So I gave him his options – paint the interior, replace the carpeting (or at least get it cleaned) or reduce the price by another $15,000 or so.  By no means did I go in, high and mighty, guns blazing, berating the seller for the fact that he was a smoker, but I did let him know that the smoking was going to be one of our challenges.

I made the mistake of including a couple articles on selling a smoking house along with the official Comparative Marketing Analysis and that set the seller off.  He was extremely offended and felt that the smoking wasn’t really that big of a deal and that I was making it a big deal.  So he chose another agent to list his house. That’s fine.  No harm done.  It was never my intention to offend the seller.  Just being honest about the challenges we faced. 

So my honesty and integrity got me in the door, but it showed me the door in the end.  Oh well.

I asked my fellow agents what they would have done and surprisingly many would have listed the house and waited for 3rd party feedback about the smoking.  So I guess full honesty in this situation may not be the best policy.  Sometimes sellers need to come to certain realizations on their own.  I definitely learned that one here.

However, one of the key topics we hear a lot about as agents, especially in a challenging home market is listening to our gut instinct a little bit more.  My gut wasn’t that thrilled about selling a home that not only needed updating, but also had 20 years of cigarette smoke that would be difficult to remove.  I’m sure the seller picked up on that. 

The unknowns for many buyers are:  Will I be able to fully get rid of the cigarette smoke?  Has it permeated through the sheet-rocked walls where I’m going to either have to replace the sheetrock (which can get costly) or somehow seal the smoke in before I repaint?  Has it soaked into the wood floors below that even if I replace the carpeting and padding will I completely get rid of the smell?  Will the smoke affect my allergies? 

When you have several homes on the market in better condition than this home selling for maybe $10,000 to $20,000 more, it becomes a bit of a challenge getting the job done, especially when certain percentage of homes in our Humboldt Real Estate market will not sell right now.  My job is to get the house sold and my gut told me the only way to sell a smoker's home that also needs quite a bit of updating is to drastically reduce the price or correct the problem.  The seller wasn't willing to do either.

So is full honesty the best policy?  I think so, however maybe in certain cases, especially regarding sensitive topics like smoking or strong pet smells, the honest truth might be better off coming from the buyers and their agents first.

Copyright 2009 Jessica Bigger.  All Rights Reserved. *Is Full Honesty Always the Best Policy?*