Positioning Your Home "IN" the Real Estate Market is Supermarket Science.

You should know the difference between being IN the market and ON the market. Being IN the market means that your agent is doing everything he/she possibly can do to make sure your home is visible to as many qualified buyers as possible. Being ON the market means that although your home is listed for sale, your home is NOT as visible as it can and should be.

That's where positioning your home in the marketplace become KEY!

Positioning your home IN the market means pricing it strategically, and placing it strategically within the marketplace. The best examples I can use for both strategies is in something you can see with your own eyes every day, or as often as you want and is simple to understand. It's that black and white.

 The next time you go into the supermarket, take special note of  where the staples are. By the staples I mean butter, milk and meat. There's a valuable marketing  lesson there.

Actually, I can tell you exactly where they are. They are in the back of the store, or at the rear of an aisle. Why do I know this? Supermarkets and grocery stores have positioning down to a science. Years of research tells the management to put those necessary everyday  items in the back of the store so you can't run in and run out without possibly picking something else up along the way. It's great marketing- no doubt about it. And the equivalent  of  that is "positioning your home  IN  the market".

The supermarkets and grocery stores have the pricing strategy down pat, too.  The most expensive items on the shelf are generally at eye level, because they are easy to see, and easy to get to. The deals are on the bottom shelf or on the top shelf, and are harder to spot. Sometimes the supermarket positioners play tricks on you where there is a "teaser" item on the middle shelf with a very low price, and an extremely marked up item right next to it. The trick they are trying to play on you is that if you see something that is priced very well on the shelf, you might also pick up that item next to it, not realizing that it has been marked up considerably.

Now I don't subscribe to any trickery in real estate, but I DO believe in  strategic pricing and strategic positioning in order to get my clients the very best price for their home. Can I tell you what the strategy is for your home? It is not the same rule of thumb for every home. It can't be. But, when you hire me to market and sell your home,  you can rest assured that I will be strategic in every move I make to get you the very best price.   Just contact me whenever you're ready.

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Having a Difficult Time Selling Your CT Home? What About Offering Incentives?

There are still plenty of options for you consider if your home has languished on the market for longer than you would like. First, it's time to review your pricing and marketing strategies, and if all looks appropriate on those fronts, you might also want to consider offering incentives.

First, review your home's pricing. Is it in line with what it should be? If your agent has not given you an up to date market analysis in the last month, it should be done now, whether or not you decide to implement any kind of incentive. You may be able to roll the cost of your incentive into the price, and no one would be the wiser. It is important that if you decide on an incentive rather than a price reduction that your home's pricing is still in "the reasonable range".
So before you implement any incentive strategies, make sure you are not "giving your home away".

Next, review your marketing from day one. Is your home everywhere it is supposed to be, and can be on the internet, and is it presented accurately and properly? Do you have quality  marketing handouts?  It's time to fix anything that needs it, before you offer any type of incentive.

The reason that these two  things are so important  is that if they are not what the market dictates that you need, the outcome  for an incentive is  wasted, and so is the time and energy that was put into it. That being said, here are a few ideas:

1. Offer to pay closing costs ( or a portion of them) If your buyer is obtaining an FHA loan, the limit for a seller concession for closing costs is four percent.

2. Offer to buy down the buyer's interest rate.

3. Offer to pay the home taxes for one year, or even 6 months.

4. Offer a One year Home Warrantee

5. Offer to pay one year's worth of Homeowner Association fees.

6. Offer to have a room (or rooms) painted, the carpeting replaced, or some other cosmetic of their choice completed  prior to closing.

7. Offer to pay the first month's mortgage payment.

8. Offer a higher commission to the Buyer's Broker

There are many incentives to choose from, and each home is different. Not so long ago, I had a listing at that backed up to the thruway. It was noisy, as I can assume you could imagine. It was a nice home, but the buyers could just not get over the noise. We offered a parking pass to the train station with the sale of the home as an incentive. ( Parking Pass permits had a two year waiting list at the time, and believe it or not, that helped to sell the home! You just never know.

So don't be afraid to try an incentive, and don't be afraid to try a unique incentive. They do work!

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The Connecticut Real Estate Market is Not Entirely Out of Your Control.

True, you cannot change the local or national economy. You cannot change the fact that home prices have fallen over the last few years. And, as you know, you cannot change the location of your home.... but you can control  Four very important aspects of the sale of your home.

The Realtor You Choose: The Realtor that you hire makes ALL the difference. We are all in the same industry, however all agents do not treat their seller clients and listings in the same way. What is standard operating procedure for service from one agent is  not even offered by another. Each agent has their own marketing plan, and  you would be very surprised at the variations. We all have our own style of communication and negotiating, and  it is important that you choose the agent that you feel will work the best for you, given all of these factors. Experience and reputation is key, too.

The  Marketing of Your Home: Your home WILL sell faster if it is marketed correctly. Make sure you get a good feel for how your agent will market your home. There are NO if's, and's, or but's about it. I cannot tell you how many poorly presented homes are on our MLS and those listings are not doing the sellers any favors.  In fact, a poorly presented listing HURTS the homeowner financially. There are  many homes that go without  brochures, as well as additional  and/or enhanced internet marketing, ...and that includes social media, too. Make sure your home doesn't go without any of these very important pieces to the overall marketing plan.

Condition: You can control the condition of your home. If there is clutter, remove it. If something needs to be cleaned, clean it. And if something needs repair and its within reason and your budget, repair it.

Pricing: Only you can set the asking price of your home. The agent cannot. A Realtor can guide you to what they think is the best listing price for your home, but only YOU can set the asking price. In the end, it is You and Your Buyer that technically determine the sales price, because without a buyer, you have no sale.

Remember, you are the seller. You are the ultimate boss. After all, it is your home and your money at stake. Give it the attention it needs to effect a sale, and hire The Right Realtor  that knows how to price your home, market your home, negotiate the best sale price possible, and see you through to closing. That's me!

I am in the business of selling homes, and I'd like to be in business with you. Contact me today to get your home IN the Market, and I WILL get your home sold.

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Sellers: Steps to Take Before Reducing the Price of Your Home

If your home has been on the market for a few months and you have not had any bids, or worse yet, you have not had many showings, it's time to talk to your Realtor about it.  This is NOT always about the price, although that may be contrary to what most agents will tell you.

In Connecticut, and more specifically, Greater Fairfield County, our MLS system allows agents to input a lot of helpful information for buyers, except it is not always utilized. In today's market, every little but counts. PERIOD- Oh, and by the way, none of these items are "little" when it comes to selling your home.

There are at least ten things on your MLS listing alone that will affect your home's marketability. Make sure that these items are addressed  first BEFORE you reduce the asking price for your home.

It's a BIGGIE!  What does your MLS listing look like?

Unfortunately, you have to be diligent about making sure that your home is represented in its best light on the MLS. The information from your MLS listing is "fed" to Realtor.com,  Yahoo.com Real Estate, Trulia, Zillow, AOL  Real Estate, and scores of other highly visited real estate websites. Incidentally, Yahoo Real Estate has MORE visitors per month then Realtor.com, so it's not only about Realtor owned websites.

What should you look for on your listing?

1. Make sure that the information is correct and complete, and the description does not duplicate any of the fields that are already there. You only have a certain amount of space in that description. If it is redundant and has information that is already provided elsewhere on the listing, that is a GRAVE error on your Realtor's part, and you are losing precious buyers and dollars  because of it.

2. Check that the room measurements and room descriptions are included, too. Do you think that's a minor thing? It's not. Buyers want information, and certain buyers will not even bother giving your home a second thought, much less look at it if they don't have any idea that the living room (for example) is big enough to hold certain furniture that they have and love.  Does the living room have hardwood floors, or sliders to a deck? If it's not on your listing,  the buyers may assume that you have carpet or linoleum, or something else rather than hardwood.

Why would a Realtor omit that? Sheer unprofessionalism, laziness or both, in my opinion. Does your master bedroom have its own bath? The listing better read that it does.  If your bath has a whirlpool or steam shower, that should be there, too. These things may sound VERY basic to you, however I can tell you with clarity that whether your home is listed for $500,000 or Five Million, there are glaring marketing errors to the tune of about 86 percent. That's right. Eighty six percent.  For the listings that I see, I calculated the percentage of OBVIOUS MARKETING ERRORS  to be 86%. I cannot believe the number is that high, and the lowest error rate that I have seen was 79 percent.  There is a very good chance that your home is in the majority, SO LOOK AT YOUR LISTING!

3. Are the taxes correct? Is the mill rate correct?  Is the lot size correct?

4.Another BIGGIE: Is the square footage of your home correct? If your agent estimated the square footage, included the basement in the actual square footage or rounded the square footage up to an even number,  IT WILL HURT YOUR HOME'S MARKETABILITY.  Yes, I am yelling here. I see it done all the time. Let me tell you why it's a very bad idea to fool around with the square footage as recorded in the town's Assessor's records

5. If you  or your agent estimates the square footage, and the number is incorrect, you may actually be sued. There is case law that I am aware of, on this where a buyer demanded a refund on the purchase based upon what he THOUGHT he bought, which turns out is not what he bought at all. I do not remember the square footages in this judgement. I do remember that the seller had to refund  "x" amount of dollars, and that was calculated upon the sales price of the home  for the square footage as presented in the listing, and then adjusted downward based upon that number to the actual square footage of the home. The agent was sued for misrepresentation  as well.   YOU ARE LIABLE FOR YOUR MLS LISTING, TOO.

6.Want to include the finished area in your basement in the MLS Listing in the main square footage section?  Not a good idea. Here's why: Let's say your home is 3,020 square feet. Your finished basement area adds another 1260 square feet. Of course that should be mentioned in the listing, but not in the main field for square footage. Your home would appear to be 4,180 square feet, and it would blatantly obvious to a buyer had a minimum square footage requirement. Trust me, they are not buying your home, when you started out with "a lie" on the square footage.  Your home may also appear  that is too big for someone who would otherwise look at it, and maybe not even bother too much with a finished lower level.  All it takes is one obvious untruth on your listing, and everything else falls under scrutiny, and  concern. Don't do it.

7. Rounding up square footage of your home? I tell my buyers to be on the lookout for any home that's listed as having square footage with an even number.
For example- 2,500 square feet, 4,000 square feet, etc.That tells me that I cannot trust the rest of the information to be as accurate.  If the home is 2,476 square feet. Say so. Don't oversell it or misrepresent it.  Market the home for what it is. By the way, I have only encountered ONE house in 26+ years of being in the business that had an even number of square feet. With the owners permission I added one square foot to the actual number so it did not look like it was estimated or rounded up. We also disclosed that as well.

8. Misrepresenting the condition of a home: The surest way turn a buyer off is to have the listing say that it's in mint condition when it's not absolutely in mint condition. It can be in fairly good condition but it's not mint, so don't market it that way.  C'mon agents. You know better than that. When a house needs repair or cosmetics, you can soft sell it, but don't go the other way around and make it wonderful when it's not.  I'm sorry, but Sellers, you're guilty here too, if you have not seen your listing and okayed it.  You know whether or not your home is in mint condition.  The buyer that  thinks that your home is in perfect condition  when they get to your home is even more disappointed. Just remember how you felt when you were looking at homes and went to a house based upon its purported move-in or mint condition. What did you think? You didn't buy that house, did you? Did you wonderwhat standards that listing agent had if they truly felt that this particular home was in mint condition? You get the drift

9. Public Schools Information: Make sure your listing has the public school information for your home. Buyers and agents alike search upon that criteria. If you see BOE or PBOE in the elementary, middle or high school data fields on your listing,  that's more  laziness on your agents part. BOE is a lot easier for some agents to type than making a call to the superintendents office to find out which public schools children would attend if they live at your address. For the record, BOE stands for Board of Education, and PBOE stands for Per Board of Education.

10. Internet Remarks:  This may not be evident in the MLS printout sheet of your home. Where it will be seen is on the multiple listing aggregator sites like Realtor.com, Yahoo.com Real Estate, Trulia, Zillow, AOL  Real Estate and others.  If your agent did not specifically enter remarks in this portion of the listing, then your  listing will not have any descriptive remarks on any of these sites.

You shouldn't even have to check that your Realtor is doing things the proper way, so most sellers never even bother to do so. You would be surprised at the lack of a thorough job  coming from a recommended agent. And here's a good one- The agent that seems to have a lot of listings is not necessarily the best. All of those listings haven't sold and are still on the market. Think about it.

If you want the best representation with a better than average sales to list price ratio and shorter time on market. Call me. I'll get your home sold, and do it the right way

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Is your home EVER going to sell? How long does it take?

If sellers only knew  what their agent WASN'T doing to sell their home, they would be appalled. Trust me, other agents can spot a lack of professionalism a mile away, and it translates right down to YOUR property, YOUR sales price, and YOUR Bottom line.

In  reviewing some listings in the three million dollar plus range for a client of mine, I ran across some rather elementary attempts at marketing, especially given the styling and features of the homes being presented.  That is certainly not to say that if your home's listing price is $50,000  that you shouldn't get good service, or great marketing. Of course you should!  The feeble attempts at marketing from so-called professionals are positively abominable, in my opinion. No wonder why so many homeowners get discouraged.

You as a homeowner, have the ability to change that.  Look at your marketing materials and your home's presentation as if you were a buyer. Does the short listing description make you want to know more about the house? Does it make you want to see that property? If  you don't see important marketable features of your home highlighted, or just see some fluffy description that really doesn't catch your eye, have your agent change it. OR CHANGE AGENTS. You lose money every day that your home is available for sale and mis-marketed, and the loss compounds over time, even if the market doesn't change.

You would think that maybe, just maybe... the listing agents would put as much information in the listing as they could. Everyone knows that we don't get paid unless the house gets sold.

Well,  think again. Misquoted square footage. misquoted taxes, impressive home features left completely out of the listing, not enough pictures, poorly presented photos, no room measurements, no room descriptions, Poorly worded and grammatically incorrect remarks. It goes on and on.

I can go on here, too. ( I know I am passionate about this- I really was taken aback after looking at these listings earlier.) Have you checked out your home on Realtor.com? Your agent can amend the description here, too. It doesn't take long, and it can make a world of difference. What about your agent's personal website? Is your home featured there? You would think this is Standard Operating Procedure, but guess what?  It may not be for that agent!  Do you happen to know what percentage of  agents haven't updated their personal site in the last six months?  That number is close to 60 percent!

If the agent is NOT taking care of their professional presence on the internet, how can they take care of you?

If you want your home to get the best marketing possible, by an experienced agent, it's time to contact me. It's time to get your home sold by an agent who cares how they market your property.

I am in the business of selling homes, and I'd like to be in business with you. Contact me today to get your home IN the Market, and I WILL get your home sold.

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