Losing Hope About Selling Our House

I'd consider renting it and moving out. It can be risky but if you find good renters it could be the way out.

Hi J.,
Look at it this way.... unless you are downsizing, you'll get a "break" too when you buy your next place because those sellers are going to be in the same "boat" as you when it comes to pricing their home. You also can't just expect for your house to sell just because it is listed at $30K less than what you paid for it. My husband has been a realtor now for over 5 years and he has told me that sellers should expect only to get approx. what a house was sold for back in 2002. Yes... the market is a buyer's market for sure right now.
It has a lot to do with the market right now, but also make sure your realtor has everything correct on the listing sheet for the MLS. From time to time my husband will catch a mistake on a listing sheet from the other realtor like that realtor listed the wrong school district or didn't list a basement when they in fact had one. (Yes, the basement one just occured.) Can you believe that?? Clients might have wanted to see that house but because it was listed as no basement, they might have crossed it off their prospective list of houses. (He knew their was a basement because their was an agent open house and he went to it.) Also.... maybe the realtor needs to rewrite the remarks in the listing to make it more appealing. Your realtor can have up to 16 photos of your property on the MLS. My husband just showed me a house for sale on the MLS that only showed 1 photo and that was of the exterior. (No... it was not a foreclosure or short sale, so why on earth did the realtor only show one photo?) So... needless to say, buyers do not mark that one down for one that want to see. Sometimes my husband will show me a photo of a house with snow in the background. Really? Now the seller's realtor should have taken a new picture for the summer months.

Buyers have their realtors get "comps" for the area based more on square footage, size of rooms, and maybe little upgrades but it doesn't pay to do really major upgrades because you will NOT get your money back in this market. Think about reducing it a bit more and put it back on the MLS as a new listing. ( This might help, but.....Realtors still can look back though to see if it is a "true" new listing. So a prospective buyer could be informed by his/her realtor before they look.)

Really.... though, if you want to sell soon, you have to let go a little of the attachment of a house that you turned into a home with your designs, love, etc... and realize and accept that you probably need to drop your listing price. (I hope that was'nt too hard..... it's something my husband tries to get through to his clients, yet he doesn't say this so directly to them because he doesn't want to cause any friction in the client/realtor relationship.

I hope this helps some!

J.

Change real estate agents

professionally clean

replace all dingy, broken items that stay, blinds, wall outlets, stovetop drip pans

every day have a clean up moment, have the kids do the baseboards

Have the whole unit professionally power washed

spruce up the outside, curb appeal-new flowers

remove all personal photographs from the wall

paint it beige or tan, not white

redo floors, replace worn wood and carpet

offer a real estate bonus. This is a bribe, the real estate agent who brings the seller gets $1000-$2000 on top of the commission. This killed me, but it did work. Your real estate agent should not take this.

Get it listed on non conventional sites. We put ours on the local yard sale website and militarybyowner.com

Get a storage unit and remove one piece of furniture per room

Get all the clutter OUT!! into the storage unit, like Christmas and holiday boxes

Pay particular attention to the kitchen

Offer some closing costs

If it is empty hire a staging company to come in and put nice furniture in the house, then they put a plaque on the wall with their advertisements

That's all I can think of right now. We have sold two houses in this slump, you have to be super proactive. I replaced carpet, wood floors, removed all blinds, professionally clenaed in and out, hired a landscaper to freshen up, repainted, bribed the real estate agents, it's all in the name of the game.

I would suggest you get a new realtor. Get one who is well educated in short sales. You hire them to work for you, not you work for them. We just went through a house sale--short sale. We just sold our house for 100k less than what we paid for it. You said you are " considering doing a short sale and walking away" I wish people knew that a short sale is NOT walking away. It is an option to get out of your house without going in to foreclosure. If you rent it and want to sell before/if the market ever gets better, you wont be able to sell it. If you are showing the banks that you can make money off this house you will NEVER be able to short sale or foreclose (just an FYI) Our short sale process was long, but could not have gone smoother because of our realtor. We had it "sold" within 5 weeks. I highly suggest you take it off the market, to start over and then start over with new answers. Keep in mind that 90 percent of homes these days are short sales or foreclosures. There is a lot of competition out there. You make think you have your house priced right but I can almost guarantee that if has been on the market for two years, it is overpriced. Go look at the competition.
Good Luck to you!!! I know how frustrating it is.

You need to take it off the market and put it back on after a spell, like a month or so. People see a house on the market for that long and they are convinced there's something wrong with it, and won't even bother to look.

Also, it may be 30K less than you paid for it, but it may still not be what the market calls for. My sister just sold a townhouse in downtown Chicago, and her guideline is that things are selling for what they did 10 years ago.

You could also consider renting. If you rent the townhouse for 2 years and sell it after that for a loss, then it's tax deductible. The loss is NOT tax deductible as a residence, just as a rental. So rent it out for 2 years and rent a larger home as well.

I know your stress -- we had to leave chicago 3 years ago for work and basically paid people to buy our house, it was brutal. I hope it turns around for you, good luck!

We ended up doing a HAFA short sale through our mtg company b/c we had no other choice. We walked away w/$3,000 at closing from the $170,000 cash that we put into the house and the house was listed at $60,000 less then what we paid for it 7 yrs ago. Without knowing what your financial standing is, I would suggest sticking it out until things improve with the market. Our situation was that we were basically forced into getting out - after 3 failed attempts at modification loans, our mortgage was just still too high. The type of short sale we did was one that forgave us the difference however we had filed chapter 7 last Sept & my husbands salary had been cut by 2/3. I would speak w/your mortgage company or a non-profit agency to see what options you may have, we had contacted Greenpath @ 877-369-7284, maybe they could offer you some advice. Depending on what type of short sale you do, your credit can be destroyed. Best of luck.

PLEASE do not consider walking away from your home. That only makes matters worse--every foreclosure brings down the value of the other properties in your neighborhood.

If we were to list our house today, our listing price would be nearly $100k less than we paid. We are also stuck. We have 3 kids--we have a backyard, but because we can't afford to do a massive landscaping project that is needed out there to make it safe, I can't let my kids run around back there. We go to the park. We had planned on living in our house for a few years, and then getting into the Naperville school district before my oldest started school. Well, he starts school next fall and there is no way in heck we can move. Oh well. I am not going to penalize my neighbors because we mistakenly viewed this house as a stepping-stone.

View your house on zillow.com and your counties web page. See what your house is listed as. This will give you a base. If you aren't listed with a Realtor try selling by owner or Nexthomes. We just sold our house for a lot less than we paid. Oh well, we made it up on the house we bought...hopefully. Good luck!

Only 30k less, I would be thrilled with that! Our house is worth 100k less than what we bought it for 6 years ago.. so we rented it out and in turn rented a bigger place in a different town. Sorta stinks having to ride out the market but what else can you do? GL

I'm so sorry to hear this. This is one of the fallouts of the housing market crashing and people who handled their finances properly getting the short end of the stick. It makes me mad and sad for you at the same time. I would work hard toward having the home rented out. Then you can either buy another home, if that's financially an option, or know that in a year or so that rental income will be added to your household income and you can find a home that's a better fit for your family. The housing market predicitions in many states say that it's not coming back until 2014, so you should still be able to get a good deal when buying again (if you have to wait a bit).

We had the same problem. We want to move out of Illinois and listed our house to do so. We had it listed for a year and our agent gave up after 3 months. Once the contract was finished, I got a referral for another agent that was well versed in short sales. That is the better option that foreclosure if you can. I would rent, but we are trying to move out of the state. If you can rent, that's another good option. Keep the faith!

How long have you been there?
Have you made improvements, repairs, updates? If so list them specifically on a sheet and attach it to the take-home sheet for your house viewings.
We sold our first house (nothing special) very quickly by doing that.

And...keep in mind you only need O. buyer.

Is your realtor working well for you? Is it on-line, the realty site, craigslist, many, many photos, etc?

my sis is stuck, too. The new condo builds in her complex are selling for $40,000 < than what she paid for hers....just 3 years ago. So sad, because at this point...she can't even refinance since the market is so down.

She & her SO are looking to sell her home, his home....& build a new home together. His will sell....hers won't. She can't even rent it for the mortgage payment. Again, so sad.

Have you had a stager come in & look at your home? Even tho' you mentioned that you've made many upgrades, it may not be neutral or empty enough to catch potential buyers eyes. & as for getting the people to your place....I'm without ideas....sorry!

.