When you're selling your home, pricing it correctly is an important key to success. Obviously you want to get as much money as possible from the sale without overpricing your home so it stays on the market too long and fails to get any serious offers. Our real estate agents are experts on pricing your home correctly and offer the following tips for hitting that sweet spot when selling your home this fall:

• Consider the local inventory of homes for sale.
  The housing market where you live may or may not reflect the market in your region, state, or nationally. If your local inventory has more homes on the market than buyers, it's considered a buyer's market. Conversely, a seller's market occurs when there are fewer homes for sale than buyers. And a neutral market is fairly even. In a buyer's market, you may have to price your home with room for a little negotiating, but in a seller's market, you may be able to get more for your home.
  
  
• Get information from comps. 
  Your real estate agent can run an analysis to determine what homes similar to yours have sold for recently in your area. You should look at homes that are under one mile from your home, if possible, as well as homes of similar age, lot size, and square footage. Comparable homes should have the same number of bedrooms and bathrooms and similar special features such as a pool or large backyard. This will give you a good idea of what you can expect to get when you sell your home and what you should list it for.
  
  
• Consider a professional home appraisal.
  A professional home appraisal is usually performed by the buyer's lender, but you can also have this done to help price your home accurately. The appraiser will consider what comparable homes in the area have sold for recently and will walk through your home to check for any upgrades or other changes that could affect its value.
  
  
• Avoid round and random numbers.
  Pricing your home precisely - but not too precisely - is important. For example, if you price your home at $250,000, it seems like a ballpark figure instead of one that more accurately reflects its value. Listing your home for $249,000 seems like a price that you've put more thought into. Psychologically, it's also perceived as much less than $250,000. And your home will show up on online searches of homes under $250,000, whereas one priced exactly at that level won't. Random numbers like $249,734 should also be avoided since they don't seem like you've taken the pricing process seriously.
  
  
• Be willing to adjust.
  You may need to lower your asking price a bit if your home has been on the market for longer than expected. Perhaps the market has slowed a bit, or an influx of similar homes in your area have hit the market. Or you may have scheduled a professional real estate appraisal that estimated your home's value as less than you have it listed for. If you're not receiving offers or similar homes for sale are now priced much lower than yours, work with your real estate agent to lower the price. It's best to make one adjustment early in the process rather than multiple smaller reductions, which may go unnoticed by prospective buyers.  

Contact us if you're interested in buying or selling a home or have other real estate needs in the Livingston County, MI area. Our family-owned company offers four generations of real estate experience along with the most state-of-the-art service available.