Is the listing on your home about to expire?

Is the listing on your home about to expire? It’s not uncommon during this time of year to see real estate listings go from active, to withdrawn and expired. The winter months are notoriously difficult for selling a home; the distraction of the holidays is a major hurdle for both buyers and sellers. Ultimately fewer viewings result in fewer sales leaving you at risk for an expired listing. If you are reaching the end of your listing period it’s important to also remember that the end of the year and the beginning of a new year is a natural and logical time to reassess your position as a seller.

If your house has been on the market for some time and the end goal is still to sell the property, it’s important to take a close look at what can be learned from an unsuccessful sale.

As a seller, you have three viable options:

1. You can extend the listing with your current agent.
2. You can find a new agent.
3. Or you can consider taking the house off the market completely.

Although it’s the last choice on the list above, lets discuss taking your house off of the market first. Its natural to feel that it may be better to take your house off the market and wait for better selling conditions, and while it may seem logical you may also find yourself in the same situation or worse. Waiting for a more “suitable” time to sell, perhaps waiting for Spring or hoping for a market increase is unfortunately no guarantee you’ll be in a better position. Yes, there are more buyers in the Spring, but there are also more sellers too so any benefit you would get from re-listing in the Spring is usually offset by the increase in competition.

If you are thinking about taking your house off the market in an attempt to offset the amount of time you’ve already been on the market, rest assured there has been a bit of a paradigm shift here. During the real estate bubble it was only taking four to six weeks for a house to sell, unfortunately that is no longer the case and houses are taking anywhere between four and six months to sell. So given the current market there is no longer always a negative stigma attached to a house that has been on the market for a lengthy period of time. Ultimately, if you’re thinking of taking your house off of the market remember this: the selling conditions aren’t likely to vastly deteriorate in the space of a few months, but neither are they likely to substantially improve so selling your house now is probably a good a time as any, and it’s certainly less hassle.

So with that in mind, the remaining options are to carry on with your current agent or find a new agent.

In terms of sticking with your current agent, most agents will almost always want to renew the contract since they don’t get paid unless the property is sold. It’s also worth bearing in mind that the agent has put in a considerable amount of time and money into promoting the property so they will most likely want to renew to avoid the exponential loss. But that said, you should consider the reasons why the house hasn’t sold before moving to another agent. There are several reasons why the house may not be appealing to buyers and in many cases the responsibility falls either on the agent or the seller, or both in equal measure.

Let’s take the list price as an example, which consequently happens to be one of the biggest, if not the biggest reason a house does not sell within its listing period. A list price that is too high could be down to the agent or the seller, and sometimes both. It could be that the agent recommended an aggressive price inappropriately; it could also be that the seller insisted on listing at a too high price to test the waters. In either case, you must consider that the list price most likely had a hand in why the house didn’t sell.

The other major factor that must be considered is the condition of the property and this has very little to do with the agent, and is almost solely the responsibility of the seller. Your agent should give you advice on how to stage a property to increase the chances of a sale, but ultimately if you do not take the advice of the agent you may be setting yourself up for a long time on the market. A lick of paint, clean carpeting and a hefty de-cluttering will unquestionably increase your odds of selling.

Furthermore, effective marketing is absolutely essential to bring buyers to your property. This important responsibility lies completely with your agent, and these days agents should be employing a multi-faceted marketing campaign including conventional and innovative methods of promoting your property. Ultimately, it is the way your property is “pitched” to prospective buyers that makes all the difference in the sale, or the failure to sell. Your agent should have the ability to focus in on what makes your house stand out and use that information to break through the vast amounts of “clutter” that comes with real estate marketing.

There are of course things that are out of the control of both the agent and the seller, including mortgage interest rates, local market conditions, buyer confidence and the overall economic climate. That said, even with the most difficult market conditions (which we have surely seen in the last few years), your agent should be able to spin a negative into a positive, and should ultimately be able to secure a sale, even if it does take longer than you would’ve hoped.

Finally, before you make the big decision to stick it out with your agent or find a new agent you should undertake an objective evaluation of the performance of your current agent during the listing period. Did they get buyers through the door? Were the open houses well attended? Was the marketing campaign thorough and aggressive? Compare the performance of your current agent to that of the local showing and price statistics (which you can also get from your agent), and if the two don’t match up you may consider finding someone else to look after the sale of your property.

Whatever you decide, 2012 is a new year and with it comes the opportunity to re-assess, re-evaluate and secure that sale!