[Leondros]

Originally Posted by Tron_fdc

Houses in the $400-$600k range are the ones moving at the moment. If you are above that in price, you need a good realtor. It's a buyers market so you have to put the work in.

I have bought or sold 4 houses this year, and when you sell it really comes down to a few things. The last house I sold was listed at $749, and within 5 days of listing closed at $719.

- Fix the little things. I spent a month getting the house ready for sale, and that included painting it entirely, fixing worn out door trim, knobs and closets, fixing faucets, burnt out lightbulbs, ANYTHING that looked worn I fixed or replaced. Washed all windows in and out, cleaned up the landscaping, shampooed carpets and deodorized. I literally vacuumed myself out of the house every day so there were no footprints in the carpet.

- stage the home PROPERLY. This is sooooooo important to do, because it gives buyers an idea what the house might look like. We emptied the house entirely, and then put in master bedroom furniture and staged the living areas. Left the other bedrooms empty except small furniture. We bought staging furniture that we were goign to use in the new house, and got rid of all the old stuff.

- update your light fixtures. It's about $1000 but you can transform the entire theme and style with new lights.

- clean the hell out of it.

- price it according to local competition prices. I've worked with realtors in the past that overvalue your home, tell you what you want to hear, list above market and then it sits for 6 months. You carry a mortgage for the better part of a year, and then reduce it to sell anyways. Total waste of time. Be aggressive with price if you have carrying costs.

Your realtor should be asking for feedback from everyone who looks at it. Take it with a grain of salt because some people are real dicks, but some people are honest and will tell you the good and the bad. They should also be giving you stats on how many times the mls number was clicked, length of views, and anyone who marked it as a favorite. They need to follow up with any potential buyers to generate an offer, and if they do generate one immediately go back to all the people who looked at it to try and generate a competing offer.

If you are interested I have the names of two top realtors that I completely trust. They are VERY aggressive salespeople who understand that the days of sitting around waiting for something to sell on MLS alone are loooooooong gone.

4 houses in a year? Are you a house flipper or do you typically hold long-term?