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SELLERS: AVOID THE EXPIRED LISTING NIGHTMARE!

SELLERS: AVOID THE EXPIRED LISTING NIGHTMARE!

As a Seller, the last thing you want is to end up with an Expired Listing after wasting time and money for months.

Often, Realtors attempt to impress Sellers with their office’s automated Comparative Market Analysis and beautiful listing presentations on their Ipad tablet. All this is certainly nice but, in the real world, it is not necessarily the new bells and whistles that end up determining if a property gets sold or not; it is the basics that make that sale possible. Hire a Listing Agent that fails at the basics and you will see your listing’s status unchanged for 6 months until it expires.

So, the key is for Sellers to make sure that their agent will deliver when it’s Showtime, literally!

As a Realtor constantly performing MLS property searches and working with buyers and international investors, it is pretty easy for me to see why hundreds of listings expire every single day. Worst of all, Sellers have no idea about the amount of showing appointments that are not being performed on their properties and the many opportunities they are missing out on.

  1. Failure to upload accurate MLS data by listing agent/office

  2. Uncompetitive Price Point

  3. Limited Realtor’s Availability

  4. Realtor’s Showing Method & Strategy (if any!)

Sounds simple right? Well, it is, but the reality is that an incredible number of listed properties fail miserably in at least one of those 4 categories, if not all!

Below, I go into a bit more detail about each problem:

FAILURE TO UPLOAD ACCURATE MLS DATA BY THE LISTING AGENT/OFFICE

MINT ERRORS WEBSITE ARTICLE

Did you know that the information, data and pictures you see on most websites while doing an online search come from the original MLS listing? This means any error made initially by an agent or office while uploading your unit onto the MLS will be reflected and directly affect what people find (or don’t find) on any of the search engines such as Google. Worst of all, the same obviously applies to the searches performed in the MLS by other Realtors. For example, if your property is listed with the wrong building name, address or area code, your unit will NOT come up in the results after a Realtor searches by one of those criteria.

UNCOMPETITIVE PRICE POINT

This one is pretty obvious but some Realtors fail to show the Sellers what they are competing against. Did you know that here in Downtown Miami a high-rise Condo has an average of 493 units and that there are 60 units listed for sale on average every single month? (For more Downtown Statistics click here to see or download my November 2015 Report)

This means that, unless your unit is very different or unique, you are going to have a lot of competition in your building and the surrounding ones in your neighborhood; and maybe in other areas as well if the buyers are looking at different zones.

This is why it is vital that your Realtor shows you the numbers of what is around you. Your listing agent must keep you up-to-date with the market. If you do not price right, get ready to see your unit stand still for a long time and, the longer it stays listed on the MLS system, the more undesirable it becomes as buyers always like to see how many days it has been listed for.

Also, starting high with your price and being forced to take it down several times is seen by buyers as a sign of weakness. Instead, pricing right and having a strategy will improve your selling chances and put you on a stronger position at negotiation time.

REALTOR’S LIMITED AVAILABILITY

Why wouldn’t a Realtor pick up the phone, answer a text or an email as soon as possible when he has the possibility of making a good sale and earn a nice commission? I do not know (I’ve been trying to figure this one out for years)!

Please, do yourself a huge favor and hire an agent that is fully committed to answering Show-requests immediately and can attend to them personally.

The ideal Listing Agent should make the best effort to become available to personally show your unit any day, any time, including after business hours and weekends. If the Realtor does not work or live near the listing’s address and finds difficulty in showing on short notice or multiple times at different hours on the same day, then you might be losing a HUGE percentage of showings weekly!

KNOW THIS: Buyers hate it when their Showing-requests are not answered within a day or two. So unless your property is special, they will just cross it off their list and tell their Realtor to show them the rest.

In the real world, it all comes down to this in Miami: International buyers sometimes visit the city briefly, have no time, and make last-minute appointments before leaving the country. Local buyers, typically have 9 -5 jobs so they can only visit properties very late or during weekends. Also, Realtors working with Buyers usually get tens or hundreds of units on their MLS search results and then try to narrow it down for their clients. If they have to pick between 2 or more very similar units and one of the listing agents is slow to answer or has limited availability to show, it will be the end of the story for that unit.

CONCLUSION: Often, there is only 1 chance to show!

REALTOR’S SHOWING METHOD & STRATEGY (if any!)

Showing a property is not just about opening a door and describing the physical attributes of a place. There is too much competition between buildings and Condos have too many similar units, so it is absolutely vital to highlight strengths and differentiate your home in order to beat the competition. Besides strategically pricing the property, the type and quality of your home’s showings is the most important factor that will determine how fast you can make a sale or if you are able to sell your place at all!

  • If your keys are left for pickup at an office or at the front desk, the showings are performed by the Buyer’s agent, who usually is not an expert in your unit/building/area. This translates into regular showings that do not highlight or differentiate your place in any way. Your unit will be just one more on a long list of properties.
  • If your Realtor doesn’t talk to buyers about the economics or financial advantages of investing in your unit now, the showing will just end up being a mere description of your unit’s physical attributes. Since most buildings and units within the same price range have similar kitchens, bathrooms, high-impact windows and materials, the buyers will not find any convincing and/or decisive advantages to your unit.
  • Mediocre showings are obviously not memorable in a good way. So unless a property has unique features, buyers might miss important points and/or forget a unit all together.
  • Some properties are not the most beautiful versus their competition but may have several major advantages in other areas, so the listing agent should be present to give the buyers a guided tour while implementing a strategy to highlight the unit’s advantages.

To conclude, there is just too much competition in Miami and similar units in the same and neighboring buildings. As it is too easy for buyers to get confused and/or overwhelmed with so many options, hire a listing agent that will be available to guide all prospective buyers while giving them a memorable showing.