How to Price Your Home for Sale

According to the latest statewide MLS statistics, homes sell within 98.04% of their current asking price and within 95.90%  of their original asking price.  How your home is priced when the for sale sign goes up plays an important role in the number of showings and how quickly you will receive an offer.   Homes become shop worn very quickly thanks to Zillow and social media and once a home acquires a reputation of being over-priced, it is frequently ignored by both buyers and realtors until it is competitively reduced, losing valuable time on the market.

So what exactly is market value and how best to determine it?  Is the tax assessed value more accurate or what the home down the street sold for last year?  Both can be wrong in today’s fast paced sales environment.  First, ignore your tax assessed value. At best it is only an indicator but not what your home will sell for to a willing buyer today.  The home down the street is a better indicator but if the sale is more than six months old, your home could be worth more or less than its actual sales price.  The best way to value your home for a sale within sixty days is to determine what other homes a buyer will look at when comparing your home to others on the market.  Actives homes for sale is a better comparison tool than pending or SOLD sales.  After all, those homes are not available for a buyer today to look at.

Once you have isolated the comparables to active only, your job is to look for homes of a similar age (within five years of the original construction) and similar styles.  For example, a two-story home has greater value on a price per square foot basis than a split-entry where half of the home may be a daylight basement.  Keep the square footage within one hundred feet for establishing the most accurate value.  And, what is most important, is to stay within the subdivision or general geographic location.  A home in southeast Anchorage should be compared only to other homes on the same street, the same development or at least the same MLS district.  Land developers initially price lots based on southern exposure, cul-de-sac or corner location.  They may offset a negative with larger square footage.  However, when it comes to resale the location of your lot may not add additional value but it will perhaps shorten the time on the market.

Most of our homes were built in the l980’s and 1990’s with little new construction in the past ten years and so the question of remodeling frequently comes up.  “But, I remodeled the kitchen and it cost $20,000.  Can’t I get that back when I sell the home?”  The answer is no.  A remodeled home has a competitive advantage when it comes to less time on the market  but the reality is a remodel is only worth about fifty cents on the dollar spent.

And lastly, but certainly not least, is how clean and uncluttered a home is for showing.  Without a doubt, good housekeeping adds value to a home.  It demonstrates the care the current seller has taken to maintain its value and the pride of homeownership.  That pride of ownership can add several thousand dollars to the perceived value of the home.