6 comments »8 Deadly Selling Mistakes
Selling Your Long Beach Homes and Condos
1 - Overpricing Your Property
Every seller wants to get the highest possible price for their Long Beach homes. Ironically, the best way to do this is NOT to list your property at an excessively high price! A savvy seller will understand the long term damage that chasing the market down will inflict upon them.
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An overpriced home or condo will cause prospective Long Beach buyers to choose to view other more reasonably priced properties. As a result, overpriced homes are not selling, and sellers are finding themselves chasing the market down. Never a good position to be in.
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Overpricing your Long Beach home and chasing the market down will eventually cost you much of the equity in your home and could send you into a short sale or foreclosure situation.
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2 - Confusing a Re-finance Appraisal with Actual Market Value
When equity is present re-finance appraisals often reflect overly high prices. Unfortunately quite a bit of this has gone on in recent years leading sellers to believe their Long Beach properties are more valuable than they actually are. Lenders allowed this tragic behavior to encourage re-financing. Naturally many sellers want to believe the re-finance appraisal is a real indication of their homes value, however nobody is better qualified to determine market value than your local Realtor®.
Working with your Long Beach Realtor®, looking at the comparables, and properly assessing the value of your home is the safest way to insure that your home is priced competitively for today’s volatile real estate market.
3 - Not Staging Your Home
With so many homes on the market in Long Beach, and so few qualified buyers shopping, it has become critical to put your best foot forward. Staged Long Beach properties just look better than their competition. Buyers are no longer interested in purchasing homes or condos that need much in the way of upgrading, nor do they always have the after purchase funds to do so. Most are barely willing to paint. They no longer have to do any of this to get a good buy in today’s market, nor do they always have the after purchase funds to do so.
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A messy or dirty home is a turn off to buyers, they will either leave or make a very low offer, it will cost you a lot of money in the sale, if you sell at all.
If you cannot afford a professional stager the many articles below will assist in placing your home in the best possible condition prior to placing it for sale.
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4 - Sellers trying to “Hard Sell” While Showing
Sellers should not be present at showings. Selling your home is an emotional experience; it is emotional for the buyer as well. Sellers often try too hard to sell to the buyer and often talk the buyer out of the sale without realizing it.
Buyers need to be able to speak freely with their agent about what they like and do not like about the homes they are viewing. They cannot and will not do that if you are present, nobody wants to insult the seller - they just want to see the home and decide if they are interested. Their agent will not be able to do their job with you present.
You have hired a professional salesperson - let them do their job.
5 - Showing to Unannounced Buyers
Sometimes a prospective buyer will knock on your door and ask to view your home on the spot. I strongly advise against this practice. Your personal safety could be at risk. Ask them to contact their agent to make an appointment to view the property. Here in Long Beach we use the Supra Key Lock Boxes to house your keys safely at your property. Only a licensed Realtor® can open the box and obtain entry to your home.
If you want to sell your Long Beach Homes, you must make them relatively easy to show. If Realtors® encounter a difficult time showing your homes, they will pass on them. The Long Beach Real Estate Market is flooded with inventory right now; they will just move on to show the next available homes for sale.
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6 - Not Qualifying Buyers
Your Realtor® should be screening buyers and making certain they are qualified. You should demand a lock in letter and a loan commitment from your buyer. These reasonably guarantee that the buyer does indeed have their loan on the terms they were promised, thereby minimizing any nasty surprises during the escrow term. Nothing can 100% guarantee that there will not be an upset, lenders are still going out of business and loan programs are discontinued without warning. Ensuring that your buyer is represented by a high caliber lender and insisting that their loan is double app-ed (qualified through 2 banks -1 as a backup to the other) is the best insurance you, the seller has during the escrow period. Insisting on the buyer protecting themself, protects the seller as well, it’s a win-win.
It can be tragic to remove a property from the market for 30 to 60 days while pursuing an escrow that does not close. By the time the property is returned to the active market there is usually a substantial loss in value.
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7 - Not Reading and Comprehending Contracts
Contracts, real estate or otherwise, are legally binding documents and should be viewed with a healthy respect. It is very important to be familiar with the terms of the contracts you sign. Most of the contracts involved in any real estate transaction here in the State of California have been drawn up by the attorneys hired by the California Association of Realtors®, among other details, there are points in these contracts that deal with the repercussions of breech of contract. You should know what these are before you sign.
Your Long Beach Realtor® should explain the contracts to you until you understand.
One of the most flagrant mis-uses of the listing contract that I have recently been witnessing far too often is the abuse of paragraph 6.
Paragraph 6 of the Listing Contract (C.A.R. form RLA) addresses the issue of the Multiple Listing Service (MLS). The contract states:
“All terms of the transaction, including financing, if applicable, will be provided to the selected MLS for publication, dissemination and use by persons and entities on terms approved by the MLS. Seller authorizes broker to comply…”
Nowhere does this paragraph state that your Realtor® is bound to place your property in the LOCAL MLS used by Realtors® in the Long Beach area. If Long Beach Realtors® do not have access to your property on the local MLS, how is your property going to be shown? Through other marketing venues? Hopefully, however the MLS is a strong pull for other agents with ready and able buyers; homes are often sold through the MLS listing - it is too important to not be participating. The MLS listing puts your property in front of the entire real estate population. I have personally witnessed some agents placing Long Beach Homes onto MLS systems out of the Long Beach area causing the seller to receive little or no showings, sometimes driving them into short sale or foreclosure.
In one instance an out of area agent placed a Long Beach Short Sale listing in the South Bay MLS. One of my buyers inquired about the property after seeing the sign. It was not in the local MLS. After locating the property and the agent through extensive online research I spoke with the agent. He informed me that he must represent all buyers and they must run their loans through him. Understand what this means. He expects to earn the commission for both sides of the transaction as well as the loan fees. He is refusing to work with other Realtors® and does not have an exclusive listing agreement, which is the only way he could do this. The property had been on the market for 5 months and had no offers, at that time.
That property is no longer on the market, it went to foreclosure. Not because it couldn’t sell, because that agent got in the way of any potential sale. I doubt the sellers have any idea what transpired. The home was vacant so the seller had no way of knowing if it were being shown or not.
You should hire a local Long Beach Realtor®, first because they know your market best and second because an out of area ageent most likely does not have a membership to our local MLS and is probably not going to buy one for your one listing - it is expensive. They can, for a small fee, place your property on the local MLS, but too often - do not.
Make certain that your Realtor® is placing your listing onto the local MLS (SoCalMLS for Long Beach).
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8 - Not Hiring an Internet Savvy Realtor®
Make sure your home is getting comprehensive exposure on the internet. When interviewing listing agents, ask them about their internet marketing campaign. Your home NEEDS to be on the internet… All over the internet, in fact. Consider these points:
- Over 80% of all home searches start on the internet.* Your home needs to be online, and findable, when buyers begin their search. Have the agents you interview show you their ability to market your property on the internet. Step back; pick keywords that should bring that item to the front page of Google. Are any of the sites that your agent is using to promote your property coming up at the top of the engines? No? Keep shopping. Better yet, call the agents on the front page of Google, they already know how to get there and you can cut right through the unlikely candidates.
- Over 25% of all Home Buyers FIRST saw the home that they purchased on the internet.* If your home is not heavily marketed on the internet, you are missing thousands of potential buyers.
- Multiple photos of good quality are the #1 thing that home buyers look for when searching on the internet for their next home.* Your listing agent MUST advertise your home with as many good-quality pictures as possible. Demand this. Few buyers frequent open houses any longer. They are shopping online from the comfort of their own homes browsing pictures, slide shows and video, deciding which properties they will view. They are going to view them on their own time schedule not in a small time window on a weekend when they have other things to do. Photos are critical!
- Make certain that your Realtor is not working another job. The market has slowed down; many agents have had to take employment elsewhere to make ends meet making it difficult to meet the many demands of their real estate career. Your Realtor needs to be available to field buyer and agent inquiries and handle the daily business of promoting your listing.
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