Real estate is about people. Business in general is tough, and selling your home carries with it some pretty hard decisions. So understanding how to disconnect with personal emotions is necessary to increase the probability of selling your house.  

Sellers often base their price point on the amount they would like to net from the sale of their home, and before the real estate bust, this thought process worked. It’s interesting that “fair market value” used to reference the “most probable price” that a willing buyer would pay a willing seller, but Arizona real estate case law now indicates that “fair market value” is actually the highest price which a property could generate. However, in today’s market many homeowners are mistakenly over-pricing their homes, and many have made the mistake of trying to recoup the dollar amount spent on improving their property and basing the list price on this factor. Remember to keep in mind that sometimes it’s a buyers’ market and sometimes it’s a sellers’ market, and somewhere in between, there is a balance but always-changing market. As a seller, one must be informed and guided on what is selling in the surrounding area and for how much, even though each property is valued on its individual characteristics.  

Ultimately it’s the seller’s decision, but understand that every seller must be properly informed and guided on their home’s price-point. Sometimes it’s not what you do, but how you do it that matters most. If the seller and their agent remember that real estate is about people, and understand the home is a marketable commodity, then a successful sale should be the end result. However, when a seller decides to overprice their home in the beginning, then more often than not, one will end up settling for a much lower price in the end. If a home sits on the market too long, buyers may think there is something wrong with the property and avoid previewing it all together. Buyers believe that if sellers would be willing to sell for much less than their list price, then the logical thing for them to do would be to just simply lower the price.  

Today’s home prices are driven by buyers who want a good deal, and by sellers who believe their home is worth more than the market will bear. Somehow a seller must be realistic and find a neutral price-point to list their home and not just ask whatever they want. Sellers must take the time to learn the market, and this can be done by reviewing a Competitive Market Analysis (CMA) of the home they are planning to put up on the market. As sellers, they must be willing to take this valuable information to heart and act accordingly on the CMA’s end results. This seems in keeping with reality that a seller’s property will appraise for this same price per square-foot because of the Sales Comparison Approach, which says the value is derived by comparing the property to similar properties that have been sold recently, and applying appropriate adjustments to the sales price of the comparisons.  

Intangible property values include the analysis of the neighborhood including analysis of access, school systems, municipal services and similar factors. This is an important element of assessing value because these are value-influencing factors. In addition, the subject property analysis must be valued based upon its individual characteristics, or that the land and homes are unique and no two properties are the same. There are countless potential distinctions between residential homes, but in the end, real estate is about people.

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