Custom Websites Give Confidence to Home Sellers

Mrs. A_ had known her real estate agent since the agent was a little girl playing with Mrs. A_’s kids at school.  But at the request of Mrs. A_,  the Realtor had listed the large luxury home on acreage about $100K above the fair market value, and it was languishing on the market.

 When the listing expired, I sent Mrs. A_ a letter explaining my Big Wow Marketing plan, and she invited me out for a visit.  She really wanted to sell her home, and she saw that I was a “go-getter,” but she had to have top dollar.  I saw that she also needed to detach emotionally from the home.  Her late husband and sons had built it for her retirement years, and much of her financial security was tied up in its value.

 I prepared my Competitive Market Analysis, and determined that the home was probably worth around $600K, perhaps a bit below that, but that I could justify a price of around $630,000.  She had listed it originally at $699K, and had come down to as low as $660K before the previous listing agreement expired.  She was not happy with my $600K price, but agreed that she would try to sell it for $630K, but “not a penny less!”

 As we prepared our Big Wow Marketing package, I started a whisper campaign with the other real estate agents in our office, and the day it went on the market, another Realtor in my office brought a prospective home buyer to look at the home.  Soon thereafter we had an offer for $575K.  Mrs. A_ wanted to see how many other offers we might get, so we waited for a month and our first 6 showings or so before she decided to counter our original offer at $625,000. The buyers wanted the home, but didn’t want to over pay, so they decided to let us sit on the market for another month and a couple of more showings before they countered us at $600K.  Mrs. A_ was really convinced that her home was worth more than that, so we had a couple of other showings over the next month. 

 We had a sit-down visit, and I reminded her of some facts.  We had been on the market for 3 months.  We had about a dozen showings.  We had only 1 offer.  She concluded that, given the tremendous efforts we had made to market the property, and the number of showings we had, that this was likely the best offer we were going to receive.  So she countered one last time at $605K!  The buyers accepted – mercifully – and we closed escrow!

 Did my Big Wow Marketing package get her more than asking price?  No, but it did give the home seller the confidence she needed that the very good price that we did get was indeed the best offer we were likely to get.  And after all, what is peace of mind worth?