Preparing Your Home For Sale

7 Steps To Get Your Expired Listing Sold

September 29, 2011 by Eric Lowry Leave a Comment

7 Steps To Get Your Expired Listing Sold

So your home has been on the market for quite a long time and it just won’t sell. The first thing you should know is that there is a problem somewhere. Homes for sale in West Chester, Liberty Twp & Mason Ohio that are priced right and are in great condition are selling, and are selling pretty quickly. Here are 7 steps for getting your home sold when it has been on the market too long or the listing has expired:

1. Consider re-listing your home for sale. Please understand, I don’t mean just re-list to get yourself a new MLS number. I mean really re-list your home. Change your price. Change your agent/broker. Change your photos. Change your mindset about selling.

2. Consider offering some incentives. Offer to pay the buyer’s closing costs. Offer to pay the buyer’s agent a higher commisson. Offer to put all brand new kitchen appliances in the home if yours are older.

3. Make your home available for showings at anytime. If you are serious about selling your home, don’t put limitations on when it can be shown. If you have pets that cause issues for showings, make arrangements for them to stay at a friend’s house or at a pet boarding center.

4. Be sure you have the best marketing. Do you have the maximum number of high quality photos, a virtual tour, a YouTube video, Craigslist advertising and exposure to all of the national as well as local internet websites? You better have, if you want your home sold!

5. Be sure you have the best photos. Yes, I am repeating this one. It is crucial that you have great photos and plenty of them. Keep in mind, if your home has been on the market for quite a while, your photos are old. They need to be current with the seasons. No pictures of homes with trees with no leaves and NO SNOW!

6. Be sure that you have the right list price. Get an updated Market Value Analysis of your home. Real estate market conditions change. Be sure you have the most current information.

7. Get your home professionally staged. I know you didn’t have it staged before you listed your home for sale the first time, because if you had done so, your home would already be sold.

So there is a good start. If your home was listed for sale for too long and you are frustrated take these tips to heart. If you are looking for solutions and want a second opinion give us a call. We can get your home sold. We specialize in homes that should have sold, but didn’t.

Just fill out the form below and we will contact you as quickly as we can.

Top 10 Tips When Selling a Home In West Chester, Liberty Twp Or Mason Ohio

September 19, 2011 by Eric Lowry Leave a Comment

Top 10 Tips When Selling a Home In West Chester, Liberty Twp Or Mason Ohio

Selling a home in a down economy can be a challenging thing to do. Use the following 10 tips when selling your West Chester, Liberty Township or Mason OH home to get your home sold for the highest possible price in the least amount of time.

Home Selling Tip #1: Hire an experienced and reputable real estate agent. Selling a home can be stressful, and you want an experienced and reliable real estate agent you can count on and trust to guide you through the selling of your home.

Home Selling Tip #2: Give your home curb appeal. When selling a home, you need to keep your home looking its best. If a buyer is turned off by what your home looks like from the street, you will never get him or her inside to look around. Clean up your lawn, patch brown spots in the grass, clear sidewalks, and keep leaves and other debris picked up. Potential home buyers also notice things like chipped paint and dirty siding, so pressure-wash your home and repaint before putting it on the market if needed. Do whatever you need to do to show buyers that you’re serious about your home’s maintenance.

Home Selling Tip #3: Make minor repairs to your home. Don’t give potential home buyers an opportunity to start nitpicking at the value of your home by leaving minor repairs unfixed. Replace cracked floor or counter tiles. Patch holes in walls. Fix leaky faucets. Fix doors that don’t close properly and kitchen drawers that jam. Consider painting your walls neutral colors, especially if you have grown accustomed to purple or pink walls. Replace burned-out light bulbs.

Home Selling Tip #4: Stage your home. Once you have a potential home buyer inside, it’s important that your home has been spruced up and has been staged for the market. Think of your home as a product for sale, and imagine walking through it from the buyer’s perspective. Depersonalize it by packing up family heirlooms and photos. You want buyers to imagine themselves living in the home and they won’t do that if they can’t see past your stuff. Rent a storage unit and clear out the junk. De-clutter. Remove unused pieces of furniture and window coverings and light fixtures you are going to take with you. Each room should be left with just enough furniture to showcase it as the perfect room for its purpose. Remove books, knickknacks, and anything that seems deeply personal. Clear out closets and neatly arrange your dishes in the kitchen cupboards.

Home Selling Tip #5: Clean your home! Wash windows inside and out. Clean out cobwebs from corners, ceiling fan blades and light fixtures. Re-caulk tubs, showers and sinks. Polish chrome faucets and mirrors. Clean out the refrigerator. Vacuum daily. Remove or replace worn rugs. Hang up fresh towels in the bathroom. Eliminate any musty odors.

Home Selling Tip #6: Price your home right. Of all of the 10 tips for selling a home, this one is the most important. You need to price your home competitively, perhaps slightly lower than comparable homes in your neighborhood. Unfortunately, many sellers choose the real estate agent who suggests the highest listing price, but this can come back to haunt you. Pricing your home to sell involves looking at similar properties, making adjustments for the differences between them, tracking market movements and considering present inventory to arrive at a realistic value for the price of your home. Setting your listing price just right could lead to a bidding war, resulting in a higher sales price for you. Be sure that you and your Realtor work together to price your home correctly.

Home Selling Tip #7: Capture initial excitement. Don’t put your home on the market before your home and you are completely ready. Make sure you have taken all of the steps above before placing your home on the market. When selling a home, you need to get the most out of the initial excitement that a new home listing creates in potential home buyers. Home buyers will feel like they have discovered a great find if they snatch up a home just as it comes on the market. Once it’s been listed for a few weeks, however, home buyers will conclude that it’s not such a great value. Therefore, when selling a home, make sure you’ve done everything you can to make your home attractive to potential home buyers.

Home Selling Tip #8: Don’t get in over your head. Put your home on the market well in advance of looking for a new home. Don’t place an offer on your next home until you have solid offers on the one you have to sell now. The last thing you want to do is juggle two mortgage payments.

Home Selling Tip #9: Only divulge information on a need-to-know basis. Don’t do anything to create a perception that you will lower your potential selling price. For example, if you are moving due to job relocation, don’t offer up that information. Don’t let the potential home buyers think there is any urgency on your part in selling the home. If you are asked why you’re selling, simply say that you’re ready to trade up. You have a legal obligation to disclose information about the condition of the home and property, but you are not obligated to disclose your personal situation.

Home Selling Tip #10: Be flexible. Be willing to work with potential home buyers to help your chances of making a quick sale. Offer to pay for closing costs or repairs, and be adaptable when it comes to showing your home. If you really need to sell, you need to accommodate buyers’ busy schedules. This might mean opening your home for showings on weeknights and weekends. Using these 10 tips when selling a home can help you sell your home fast and for a good price.

Wondering what your home’s current market value is??

Get your own >> Personal Real Estate Market Update

Other articles that you may find of interest:

The Top Reasons Your Home Didn’t Sell

How To Sell Your West Chester, Liberty Twp or Mason OH Home Now

Looking To Sell Your Home? Use the contact form below and we will get back to you as quickly as possible!

West Chester & Liberty Township OH Real Estate: The Top Reasons Your Home Didn’t Sell

December 29, 2010 by Eric Lowry Leave a Comment

So your home was listed for sale and didn’t sell. No doubt you have tried to figure out why. Here are the top reasons that your home didn’t sell when you had it on the market listed for sale:

Reason #1: Your home is not staged!

As I have discussed in previous articles, preparing your home for sale is critical. In today’s real estate market hiring a professional stager is the surest step to success you can take. We have come to believe that staging a home for sale is so important that when you list your home for sale with the Lowry Team by January 31st, 2011 we’ll include a staging consultation at no additional cost to you.

Reason #2: Your home is not updated!

What does your home is not updated mean exactly? While this can be a little subjective, it means your home is freshly painted in modern, neutral colors, you have clean, newer, neutral carpet, stainless steel appliances, newer light fixtures and newer bath fixtures to start.

Reason #3: Your home is difficult to show!

What is difficult to show? If an agent is showing homes in West Chester, Liberty Township, Beckett Ridge and they call to set an appointment on your home, is the process quick and easy? Or is the agent told that they can only show your home on weekends or only after 5:00pm during the week. Can your home only be shown when you have time to run home and get the pets out of the house or clean the litter box? The only acceptable showing instructions that you should have, are that your home can be shown with very short notice, any time or day of the week. You cannot afford to miss a single showing. And by the way, please don’t suggest the agent come on a different day because it would be better for you. They aren’t coming back.

Reason #4: You have the wrong real estate agent!

Picking the right real estate agent is critical to your success in selling your home. You are relying on your agent to provide the very best pricing strategies. You are depending on your real estate agent to have the very best, cutting edge marketing plan. You are depending on your real estate agent to be sure that you have the very best photos of your home taken, to interpret the feedback from showings and to be available when it matters most. You are depending on your real estate agent to be able to negotiate the very best possible terms in the offer to purchase for you. Be sure that you have the right West Chester & Liberty Township real estate agent representing you in the sale of your home!

Wondering what your home is worth in today’s real estate market? Request a market analysis here!

How To Sell Your Home In West Chester & Liberty Township OH Now

December 20, 2010 by Eric Lowry Leave a Comment

In my previous post I said that You Must Sell Your Home Now if you wanted or needed to sell. Basically that you shouldn’t wait to sell, if you were going to get the highest possible price for your home. Today I will tell you “How To Sell Your Home Now”.

First thing you should do to sell your home now is, stage your home for sale. What I don’t mean here is, ask your neighbor or your friend for their opinion on how really nice your home is. You are not looking for validation. In today’s real estate market you need to hire a professional stager to assist you in preparing your home to sell. If you think this is just not in your budget, think again. The cost of a staging consultation will more than be offset by a higher sale price (= more money for you!) Need a recommendation for a great home stager? Call or Email Us, our contact info is a the bottom of this article.

Second thing you should do is price your home to sell. The list price of your home should be determined by a detailed market analysis performed by a full time, experienced real estate professional. Price your home exactly where it should be to sell based on this market analysis. If you are using words like “let’s try it at this price first” or “let’s just test it at this price” you are setting yourself up to be on the market for a long time and sell for much less. You can be one of the “been on the market for a year” horror stories.

Third thing you should do to be successful in getting your West Chester, Liberty Township & Mason Ohio home sold now is to select a Realtor to represent you that has an extensive marketing plan. The Realtor that you select also should be an experienced negotiator. Today’s real estate market is not for the faint of heart either as a seller or as a real estate agent. In today’s real estate market an experienced real estate agent matters more than ever!

So there you have it. It’s pretty simple really… Prepare, Price It Right and Hire An Experienced Professional!

Wondering what your home is worth in today’s real estate market? Request a market value analysis here!

Search All Of The Homes For Sale In The Entire Cincinnati MLS By Clicking Here!

West Chester & Liberty Township OH Real Estate: Preparing Your Home To Sell (Part 3)

November 7, 2010 by Eric Lowry Leave a Comment

Are you getting your home ready to list it for sale? Preparing to sell a home in West Chester, Liberty Township or Beckett Ridge can be an overwhelming task if you are not prepared. The process of getting your home ready can be simplified by breaking the areas of your home up into groups.

In my previous posts, >>Preparing Your Home To Sell, we covered Curb Appeal, Front Entry / Porch & Landscaping and in >>Preparing Your Home To Sell (Part 2) , your first impression was covered.

Today we will cover the first floor living areas including the formal living room & dining rooms, the family room and first floor study. When you are trying to get propspective buyers to fall in love with your home, you need to offer them enough space that they can easily imagine themselves and their belongings living comfortably in your home. They are going to make observations about whether the space inside your home feels open and spacious or tight and cramped. Give the buyers the vision of enough space for their wants and needs and you will get your home sold.

De-Personalize: Everyone’s home is defined by the homeowner’s personal taste and right now your home is defined by yours. You need to transform your home to meet your buyer’s need. To do this, you must take “you” out of your property. In essence what you are doing is de-cluttering. You will eventually have to pack up your belongings anyway, so start now by packing up all of your collections of figurines, sports collectables, commerative dishes, etc. At best these collections will distract buyers from truly seeing your home, worse yet they may likely see them as clutter.

**Keep in mind; you may need to rent a storage space for a short period of time to store all of the items that you are going to be packing up and/or moving early.**

In the family room and formal living room you will need to remove or replace any personal or family photos. You want buyers to feel at home in your property and if they are surrounded by photos of you and your family they will feel as though they are just guests in your home. They may also be distracted from looking at the features of your home by all of your photos. Also needing to be removed are any signs, pillows or plaques with written sayings on them. There are many great quotes to be found on household items, they just don’t have a place in the home sale process.

In these rooms less furniture is better also. Take an honest look at how much furniture you have. Can you remove that extra table to open up some space? Any furniture that blocks a window must be removed. Removing the ottoman is almost always a good idea also. Any freestanding bookcases in these two rooms must go. They aren’t adding any value and they certainly have clutter on the shelves. Also needing to be removed are baskets, decorative screens, magazine stands and all live plants. Remove all items from fireplace mantels and from window sills.

In the dining room, remove any leaves from the dining room table until there are no more than 4-6 chairs situated around it. Again, here in the dining room all collectibles, excess dishware, etc. must be removed. Any glass enclosed dining room furniture pieces should be very sparcely decorated/filled.

In the study/home office the desk top must be completely cleared off of all stacks of papers, files, magazines, etc. All extra tables, freestanding bookcases and mis-matched file cabinets must be removed as well. On the walls, all of the awards, diplomas and photos must also be removed. This space must be staged to create a space that the buyer can picture themselves working in. If this space is being used as something other than a home office or if the furniture here is mismatched, consideration should be given to buying a nice desk and chair to stage this room or contact a home stager for rental options. Any built-in bookshelves in this room or any other room in the house should hold only hardcover books that fit properly on the shelves. No paperback books or oversized books, pack them up!

Why do you have to do all of this you ask? Because you are going to be trying to sell your home for the highest possible price that you can get and clutter costs money. De-cluttering your home for sale will help you sell for more. If you list your home for sale without doing any home staging and your home doesn’t sell, your 1st price reduction is likely going to be $5,000 – $10,000, so de-clutter. It’s worth it! Keep in mind I’m not suggesting you throw your belongings away, just pack them up and put them in storage. All you are really doing here is getting a jump start on the packing for when your home sells.

You are now on your way to creating a great impression for home buyers as you continue preparing your home for sale in today’s West Chester, Liberty Township, Beckett Ridge and Mason, Ohio real estate market. In the next post in this series of articles we’ll cover Preparing Your Kitchen.

Read the first article in this series here >> Preparing Your Home For Sale In Today’s Real Estate Market (Part 1)

Read the second article in this series here >> Preparing Your Home To Sell In Today’s Real Estate Market (Part 2)

Wondering what your home is worth in today’s real estate market? Request a market value analysis here!

West Chester & Liberty Township OH Real Estate: Selling Your Home During The Holidays!

October 28, 2010 by Eric Lowry Leave a Comment

Selling your home in today’s real estate market can be very challenging and that is just the reason that every seller should take advantage of every opportunity that presents itself. Many homeowners who are thinking of selling this time of year or that have been trying to sell with little success, start to think that perhaps they should wait until after the holidays or until spring. So let’s look at the opportunities that the immediate fall and holiday time periods present:

First, the inventory of homes for sale (the competition) is lower right now, so your home has a better chance of capitalizing on the buyers that are out there looking right now. Many homeowners are planning to wait until after the holidays, which will cause a flood of new listings to come on the market then. Without an increase in buyers looking, this increased supply of homes for sale will likely cause a further drop in home prices. If you truly want to get the best possible price for your home (and I’m sure you do), consider selling your home during the holidays.

Second, your home may show better while it is decorated for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Homes that are nicely decorated for the holidays look nicer than at any other time of year, why not use this opportunity to impress potential buyers with the warmth and added beauty of your homes interior. Please understand, buyers buy homes based on emotion and a really nice home, decorated beautifully can seal the deal.

Third, the buyers that are out looking at homes right now are serious buyers. You may not get as many showings, but the ones you get will be serious. The “just looking” buyers are not out at looking at homes now. The buyers that are out looking at homes for sale in West Chester, Liberty Township, Beckett Ridge and Mason right now are ones that are relocating to the area or have sold their current home and need to buy quickly and of course there are always first time homebuyers looking.

Fourth, marketing matters in today’s challenging real estate market and getting ahead start on the rush of inventory coming after the holidays can put money in your pocket. Homes that sell quickly sell for more! Getting your home on the market now get’s the marketing process going during a time when the photos of your home will look so much better. Photos taken now vs photos taken in January or February can make a huge difference, not just in the still photography, but in the creation of the virtual tours and online videos that we create of your home.

Click Here To Search The Entire Cincinnati MLS Database Of Homes For Sale! Wondering what your home is worth in today’s real estate market? Request a market analysis here!