Selling your home in Boston … in 28 days

Think the local real estate market is in the doldrums? Afraid to list your home for sale because you assume it won’t sell?

I’m here to tell you otherwise.

If you do everything right, you will be able to sell your condominium, for the right price, in a relatively-short period of time.

I recently had the privilege of helping a client sell his home in the South End. Here’s what we did in order to sell it.

* We priced it right

The property is a one-bedroom condo, approximately 614 square feet, top floor in a four-story building.

Next door, a slightly-larger (645+/- SF) unit had just been put on the market for $439,000. The living room had nice built-in bookcases and was nicely painted but it had a galley kitchen instead of an open floor plan, which was seen as a negative.

Otherwise, it was almost a mirror-image of my client’s condo.

The big difference was that the unit next door didn’t have a roof deck. My client’s home had a brand-new 160′ private roof deck with views of a park across the street and “sweeping” views of both the South End and Back Bay.

We figured the unit next door must have received an offer close to full-asking since it went under agreement in just 30 days. (In fact, it had; it was listed at $439,000 and we found out later it had sold for $430,400, according to the public record.)

We looked at a couple of other comps. A smaller unit (545 SF) down the street sold for $402,000 but the per-square foot price was higher.

So, we knew the “right” price was somewhere in there.

We considered putting the property on the market for $449,000 or even $454,000. What was most-important, however, is what the owner ultimately thought the property was worth and how much he wanted to ultimately sell it for. I never ask my clients what their “bottom-line” number is but I do ask them to at least have a number in mind.

In this case the seller shared with me that his goal was $430,000 or so. He also let me know that his hope was for an easy and fairly-quick sale. We were listing it in early-April and were hoping to find buyers interested in beating the federal homebuyer tax credit deadline of April 30. So, I advised him to put the property on the market at a price close to what he wanted to get – this was not a situation where we wanted to “test the market”. If we put it on over $454,000 we risked losing those buyers looking under $450,000 (although, hopefully, their agents would be wise enough to look over this price).

We considered $449,000 but in the end went for $439,000, given that the unit next door had the same price. Our property was better (in my opinion and in the opinion of the seller) but it was so recent that it was surely going to be a comp pulled by any buyer and/or his agent. Since my client was comfortable with the $439,000 we figure we should go with it.

* We marketed the hell out of it

Price drives traffic. But if no one knows about the listing, no one’s going to come by to look at it. So, we listed the property in both LINK and MLSPIN, the two Boston-area listing services. We created an attractive brochure with photos and long descriptions. We mailed copies of the listing sheet to people in the neighborhood. We held open houses.

While the typical listing in MLS has four photos, my listing had 20. No sense only giving perspective buyers a photo of the front of the building (?!) or one of the kitchen, we gave them the full package – kitchen, living room, bedroom, bath, and roof deck views. We didn’t have time to put together a floor plan or video tour but both of these are offered by In Realty, Inc.

We had the property profiled on my blog (here) as well as on the In Realty website and on boston.com and Realtor.com. This added exposure meant the listing was in front of more eyes and in front of more buyers.

We put the listing in MLSPIN on Sunday night so that it appeared “New” on Monday morning. This is a great way to get the most amount of interest – perspective buyers come into work on Monday determined to look for a new home after spending the weekend talking about it with their spouse or significant other – “Let’s buy a condo!” So they go online to start searching.

By putting it early in the week we also drummed up interest in people prior to the following Sunday’s open house. Many buyers would want to see the property before the open house in the hopes of beating everyone else to the punch. A good property is in high demand and they know this.

Also, by putting the listing in MLS and LINK before Wednesday we guaranteed its placement in the Boston Courant newspaper and Boston Homes paper, which are used by countless buyers when searching for homes in the downtown Boston real estate market.

* I showed it whenever I could, whenever asked

We had four calls within the first 24-hours and I showed the condo four times within the first 48-hours. I had a second showing on Thursday and we had an offer on Friday. I was pleased by this, as was the seller.

After the original buyer pulled out (details below) we relisted. I had four showings, that week. By the end of the week we had a second offer (higher than the first!) which we signed. Fourteen days.

Many, many times, it is difficult to get appointments scheduled. I have worked with many buyers and almost always sellers’ agents are slow to return phone calls, inaccessible, and/or unwilling to show their properties at times convenient to my buyer clients. Even in this slow market, you see this over and over and over again.

I made the vow long ago to always be available for showings. It pays off, in many ways.

* We were polite and receptive to any and all offers and accommodated all requests

The first offer came in at $415,000. I’ve made these low-ball offers on behalf of many buyer clients – it’s uncomfortable because you know the seller’s agent and seller aren’t going to accept it (they just aren’t). In my case, it was very unlikely since the property had only been on the market for five days. The buyer’s agent in fact stated this herself “I know it’s too low.” Ow. I’ve never said that about a client’s offer. You just present the offer and make your case for it.

Of course, it was “too low” given that other, similar properties were selling for higher prices per square foot and/or at higher prices.

I discussed the offer with my client. The offer came with the standard contingencies (home inspection, mortgage) but was very clean otherwise (six weeks to closing).

We decided to tell the buyer we were sticking with $439,000. I called the buyer’s agent and told her we appreciated the offer and wanted to work with her and the buyer. If she had a reason to believe the property was worth less then please let us know.

The buyer came back with $430,000. (Much better, he got the picture!)

My client came down to $437,000.

The buyer came up to $435,000.

Deal!

I have never had an easy time negotiating prices with listing agents. Most of the time, the agents give attitude – for absolutely no reason. “WHY IS THE OFFER SO LOW???” asked one agent to me. “BECAUSE IT’S NOT WORTH WHAT YOU’RE ASKING,” was what I responded (at least, in my head).

There’s no reason for real estate agents to be so EDIT annoying EDIT, yet they often are. Some of it is just habit – in the past, they could ask for full-price offers and expect to receive them. In a hot market. No longer. The other reason agents don’t like lower-priced offers is because they dread having to go back to their seller clients to tell them they don’t have full-priced offers. Sellers can be short-tempered, impatient, and “prickly”. Giving them an offer of $415,000 on a $439,000 listing might make them explode.

This is the fault of the agent as much as anyone else. The agent should prepare the client for any and all offers and situations. My client knew that offers would come up low – it’s the market. My client knew this. He also knew he might encounter few buyers, regardless of the value of his home. The spring market had begun but it was a tenuous market and we had no idea if buyers would be out there. Therefore, we wanted to work with anybody who made an offer with the intent of getting them to a price that we could all live with. My client also knew the value of his home and that we should be patient to find a buyer.

So when I spoke to the agent I was polite and considerate.

* We dealt with difficulties

So, we accepted the offer on that first Friday. Both sides signed the contract. I still had the Sunday open house because it was in the newspapers and because it’s my belief that you should still market your property until you have a signed purchase & sale contract (after the home inspection).

I told everyone who came in (there were like 20 people) that we had an accepted offer but to look around, anyway. Several left their phone numbers and names and agents’ contact info. Many people liked it. (Not accepting the first offer and waiting for additional offers from people at the open house would have been one strategy but I feel that we made the right choice; there was no guaranteeing that there would be any offers coming out of the open house and the first offer was strong and without any restrictions, so we went for it. Bottom line: the seller was happy with it.)

That week, the buyer came in for a second look with a family member. Then, we had the home inspection. It was very clean – a couple of minor points made. The buyer seemed happy with it.

Then, he changed his mind. For no good reason.

This was on Friday. We had no chance on getting a new open house scheduled for Sunday, which was annoying.

We moved forward. I called all the agents to let them know the property was back on the market.

One of these people was interested and came back for a second showing.

He then made an offer – a full-priced offer. Actually, OVER asking – $440,000. (Go me!)

We negotiated the terms very quickly (closing date, specifically) and we had a deal.

Boom.

Fourteen days, signed offer.

Under agreement, twenty eight days.

Closing, six weeks later.

We made the home buying process easy

I was always available to show the property to the buyer so he could show it to family members and so he could come in to take measurements. I was also available for the home inspector(s) and bank appraiser. I was available to the buyer’s agent, to the lender’s representative, and to both sides’ attorneys. I attended the closing and helped resolve any outstanding issues. I remembered to bring the escrow check and keys to closing (ha, ha). In short, I was available whenever necessary with a smile on my face.

So, there you have it. You can sell your home quickly for the price you want if you’re willing to work at it and if you’re using the right real estate agent.

Related posts:

1. How not to sell your home … in 180 days
2. Are real estate agents going to repeat past bad behavior?
3. How do I buy a home? Steps to buying a home or condo in Boston
4. Tough times to be a Boston real estate agent (p. 1)
5. Short-sale home properties can cause headaches with second mortgages, PMI