The Right Way to Price Your House When Listing

Angela Fox Broker Associate podcast

The sales price of your home is one of the most important aspects of the sale, so pricing it correctly will have a huge impact on your success as a seller.

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When the time comes to list your home for sale, how should you determine the sales price?

Marketing is a huge aspect of the success in selling your home, and its price is a huge part of that. You want to start by pricing your home right at market value, and don't overprice it by any means.

Remember, the activity and showings you get will be based on price. You'll always get the most activity during your home's first 30 days on the market, and if you overprice it from the beginning, you will really shoot yourself in the foot.

How you price it also determines how many buyers come look at your home. Pricing right at market value automatically means you're reaching 60% of the available buyer pool. That number gets cut in half if you overprice your home by just 10%.

When considering your list price, you also want to avoid these common misconceptions that can hurt your sale.

1. What another agent says it's worth: Do your research to find a professional agent who can price it accurately and has a great list-to-sales price ratio. Many agents will price the home high in the beginning of the sale only to come back and ask you to reduce the price.
2. What your neighbor says: We get this a lot, but your neighbor probably isn't in the trenches of real estate day in and day out like us agents. There are so many factors that go into valuing a home—it's not just price per square foot. We have to consider bedrooms, bathrooms, the location, the quality of finishes, and many, many more things.
3. Assessed tax value: Tax values are assessed in arrears, meaning they're assessed 18 months prior to where the market value for your home is currently at. That's why there's no way the assessed value can be totally in line with the current market value.
4. Pricing based on what you need: For example, you might need $100,000 for a down payment on your next home and think you can work backward and price your home accordingly from there. That's definitely not an appropriate strategy.
5. What you paid for the house: This has no impact on the home's true market value now.

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What you paid for your house has no bearing on what it's currently worth.

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You want to bring out a real estate professional to provide you with a comparative market analysis (or CMA) so you have an accurate price range of your home's current market value in order to have a successful sale.

If you have any questions about your home's value or you're thinking about selling, don't hesitate to give me a call or send me an email soon. I'm always happy to help!