It’s a tough market for sellers right now. There are three elements to successfully selling in this (or any other market that you’re likely to see in the next several years). They are Price, Condition, and Marketing. I will deal with each element individually.

Rule #1–Setting Your Price

Just a few words about setting a price. Imagine that your 2000 square feet of house, is actually 2000 shares of IBM stock. When you bought the shares, they were $85 each ($170,000). During the time that you owned them, they went up to $90 each ($180,000), dropped to $79 each ($158,000) and they are currently valued at $83 each ($166,000).

Guess what the current market value is?

$166,000 or $83 each!

(As I have previously written, the average Tooele County market value has dropped about 12% to 13% over the last 2-years!)

In today’s market, it doesn’t matter what the value was at any other point in history-only what today’s market value is (if you need to sell today!). Now there are some weaknesses to this comparison. The value of unfinished square feet in a basement would be considerably less than the value of finished square feet in the living areas of the house. If you converted unfinished square feet to finished square feet during your ownership, you would have increased the value of the house-by adding shares of full value stock to your portfolio–and your listing price would be higher than if you had made no material improvements. However, the value is determined by the market. Your house will sell for a price that is directly related to the recent selling price of other properties in your marketplace. If you don’t price it right, it will not sell!

Talk to your Realtor® about a Current Market Analysis (a CMA, also known as a competitive or comparable market analysis), and use this price range to set your listing price.