We have sold 7 homes and purchased 8. I wish I had known every RE agent and seller we encountered would lie to us when we bought the first house. We are easy going and trusting. It has finally sunk in we shouldn't be when it comes to buying and selling property. But, knowing us, if we sell and buy again, I am sure we will be lied to again and fall for it again.

Good point, nightowl. Bying and selling has nothing to do with 'making new friends'. This is business. Be polite, but say little and assume nothing. Verify everything for yourself. Keep your eyes and ears open. Look beyond the surface.

Time and time again, realtors, at least in my area, aren't interested in getting the highest sales price but the fastest sales time.

Think about it: How much does 20K more or less make in terms of a split commission? Here, it's 600.00. Considering that the average home sales price is around 800K, from the realtor's point of view, it's really not worth another two months or however long on the market.

Nosoccermom -- excellent point. Our last sale, the RE agent actually said "but guyyyysssss (imagine whining here), we have a live buyer." LOL -- the house had been on the market less than 30 days and was appreciating 2K/month. We were in no hurry and the the agent was going to make a bunch off the sale. The "live buyer" ultimately bought the house just below our asking. He tried after the contract was signed to get 20K out of us and we refused. Again, whining agent.

Just because you love your house and put your heart and soul into "improvements" there may not be another soul on earth who likes your style.

Important lesson, remove your emotion and ego, understand it is a business transaction, knowing this can save everyone time and money.

I've had agents who lied, omitted information, etc., but to say ALL agents and sellers lie, is just not true. I've had honest, ethical agents who clearly protected my interest.

Umm.. I did not say ALL agents and sellers lie. I said every one we have encountered has.

You are right, you said EVERY agent.

Yes -- every agent and seller "we" have encountered lied to us during every purchase and sale. Not every agent and seller in the universe. Just the ones we encountered. Although - I think our small sample is a bit of an indicator that a good share of agents and sellers lie. I wish I had known that would happen when we first started.

Yes, I think don't believe everything you hear but at the same time, if the agent seems to have been up front and then the unexpected happens, resist the temptation to think that the agent must be in on it. Or the agent's boss.

Sometimes the seller really is demanding what the agent says he or she is demanding, even if none of it seems to make sense at this emotional time.

"Umm.. I did not say ALL agents and sellers lie. I said every one we have encountered has."

And you finished up with, "But, knowing us, if we sell and buy again, I am sure we will be lied to again and fall for it again."

Extrapolation, ya gotta love it.

When I found the last house we bought, I knew we would buy it (4 BR house, preferred neighborhood, asking price was well within our budget). We were only tentatively working with an agent at the time who was sending us listings, but not this one. Wish I would have called the seller's agent and dealt with him directly.

Why, handmethathammer? I always suggest that buyers use a buyers agent instead of dealing with the sellers agent, who can't help but be in a conflict of interest situation. We've had good luck when buying with that approach.

Don't discount how much you will miss your 'old' house. I believe this is especially true if you have raised children and formed relationships with neighbors.

Our real estate agent flaked out at the end. I don't know how I would have prevented this. We knew her from before when we bought our house, and she was always very helpful. So we contacted her to sell the house.

She ended up finding a buyer and being a double agent. Not sure what we could have done to prevent that. Not like we were going to reject the offer!

We ended up in some tricky negotiations after inspection re: closing early and rent back (see my post in the other thread). We didn't want to do it but she pressured us saying we were being unfair to her buyers, etc. She also stopped communicating with us even when we would send an email or leave a voice message, she would rarely return it.

She misrepresented the buyers' situation significantly to us (we met them after the closing as we were moving out - she told us they had a different number of children that they had, were from a different country than they were actually from). I don't really think it was intentional, but I thought it was odd, like she didn't know or remember her clients that well. Or maybe she was just being manipulative.

The worst was when the closing fell through on the designated day. We had signed paperwork in advance. So we were expecting some confirmation from her a few days later that everything had transferred and got silence. We sent multiple emails and left phone messages and didn't get a return call. My poor DH stayed up all night worrying that our deal had fallen through and we were going to be unable to complete the purchase on our current house.

She finally called us the next afternoon to let us know that the bank had a paperwork hold up and the closing happened about 24 hours after it was have supposed to have taken place. Which was no big deal, but the lack of communication on something like that was inexcusable. I still don't understand what possible excuse she could have had for not just calling us back with an update.

DH thinks she just decided to prioritize her buyers ahead of us, since we were moving out of town and never would use her again vs. they may sell in a few years or recommend her to someone they knew or whatever. Or maybe she just liked them better. Overall, it was incredibly stressful but could have been much less stressful if she would have just responded to emails and voicemails.

I realize many people already check one website against another when home shopping, but
the one website that I really have come NOT to trust is Zillow and it's
Zestimates. Whenever I was looking around for houses to buy this go
around, I'd try there and other sites (such as RLS) for available
properties. It'd show them as available and my realtor would say, nope
it's under contract. Or it'd show the price as worth far less than I
know someone would pay for a house (our market is hot right now and it
doesn't take that into account). Or far inflated! I thought I'd look
around and see if I was in the ballpark in my estimation of their
Zestimates. Looks like I am not alone. Here are articles saying those
very things:

Washington Post-How accurate is Zillows Zestimate

You can't trust Zillow and its estimates

The Problem With Zillow Home Value Estimates

My
point is, take their Zestimates with a grain of salt and take into a
account the factors that a computer program cannot. Learned this one
from my realtor and real life.

The Post OP/ED piece was written by a Realtor... see any conflict there?

Also, read the rebuttal, linked to in the first paragraph.

See how well the Realtors priced home values compared to ultimate sale price.

Zillow can be a helpful tool if used properly. If you simply type in a street address and read the Zestimate, not so much.

Salti, if you read the article they said the same thing as you Zillow COULD be useful. But then explained why Zillow isn't good at its job when it comes to Zestimates. It can give you some good info, but I've seen better sites, e.g. Trulia has a crime map I found far more useful. Moreover, I'm telling you from my personal experience, it didn't ever get it right, not on price, not on listing... Not once. Here's my favorite example. If this house had been up to par in that neighborhood, it could well be worth their estimate. It's not even worth the $174,000 all other sites has it listed at. Why? It was built wrong. It's slipping off its foundation. Not only that, the previous homeowner made the oddest modifications to it. Zillow doesn't take that stuff into it's mathematical program. Tough noogies if you're a salesman for them. If you are (which you must be because you always stand behind it like it's the be all and end all), tell them their tools need work.

" Moreover, I'm telling you from my personal experience, it didn't ever get it right, not on price, not on listing... Not once."

I'm telling you from my personal experience that Zillow is spot on with it's Zestimates for my neighborhood. The anomalies appear with updates and upgrades done without a permit.

I guess you and I should each write an OP/ED piece for the Post.

You didn't address how their computer program misses the nuances that make a house buyable. If that's a word. I think that's highly important and something outside their grasp.

I'm glad they're getting your neighborhood right, but those other articles also said what I said. You're really lucky, but the rest of us are up a creek.

So SaltiDawg, you're extrapolating that because they're accurate in your neighborhood, Zestimates are accurate everywhere?(couldn't resist) :-)

Zillow is certainly inaccurate if one is not looking in a cookie cutter neighborhood.. I love this zillow. zestimate of $2,352,353, the same Zillow site shows it sold last month for $4,499,000. Does Zillow really think a buyer paid more than $2 mil over market. I know Zillow is not using a human for zestimates, but it seems it could input some triggers to review a Zestimate, how about using a recently sold price.

ZILLOW

weedyacres,

I did not suggest Zillow is in any way accurate in its Zestimates. I just offered, "I'm telling you from my personal experience that Zillow is spot on with it's Zestimates for my neighborhood."

Too often I think we see folks pointing out a bad valuation from Zillow on a local (to them) home and proffer the conclusion that Zillow is terrible in general.

I offered a data point where Zillow is accurately publishing Zestimates in my area in my judgement. I did not extend that belief to include any suggestion that Zillow's Zestimates are good across the board.

That said, I think Zillow is one of many valuable tools available.

I do wonder salti, do you check other sites like redfin, trulia, movato, remax, homes.com realtor.com, etc.? At least for comparison and/or other site features?

Of course. I would utilize any and all tools of which I were aware. I sure would not dismiss out of hand any single one of them because of a www post pointing out a terrible Zestimate on a home next state over.. And I sure wouldn't use one exclusively because of a post pointing out Zillow was accurate in a single poster's neighborhood.

I do wonder, would you?.

I do not pay attention to Zillow Zestimates. I know they aren't a true measure of the value of a home. Recently sold properties provide a better picture, although even that can bite you in the arse.

Why, handmethathammer? I always suggest that buyers use a buyers agent
instead of dealing with the sellers agent, who can't help but be in a
conflict of interest situation. We've had good luck when buying with
that approach.

I wish we would have contacted the seller's agent because there may have been more wiggle room in price, as the commission would not have to be split. Our agent did nothing but arrange the viewing and write the offer. She did not find the property....I did. We did not get any kind of deal, pretty much paid asking price....and I was glad to be the first one to do it.

Zillow is running numbers from a remote location. They can't do something fundamental. The salesmen in "The Music Man" explain it well: "Ya' gotta know the territory!"

Zestimates work well where there are a lot of close comps. There is also useful information that used to be closely held by Realtors, but the buyer/seller needs to apply some local knowledge to parse the data.

Not only buyers benefit from getting out and *looking* at properties for sale. Sellers should also get out and look at their competition. Both need to look at *recent* Sold figures.

"Too often I think we see folks pointing out a bad valuation from Zillow
on a local (to them) home and proffer the conclusion that Zillow is
terrible in general."

Well, yes, and no. One could argue that if several people notice that Zillow is inaccurate in their area, then Zillow is inaccurate.Period. It's a paradox because how would you know when to rely on Zillow or notunless you used different sources.

What you said applies to any and all pricing info sources.

"One could argue that if several people notice that Zillow is inaccurate in their area, then Zillow is inaccurate.Period." Nope.

Zillow is way off the mark in my area, especially for my house. We bought this house 36 years ago before it was even built. Only 2 houses on our block have not been resold, and ours is one. Our house was the most expensive on the block because of view and size, but it is listed way below the smaller neighbor's house because all they know is what we paid for it 36 years ago, and the neighboring house has been sold 6 times.

I have noticed that when we are moving from the area, during negotiations, our agent will shift to favoring the buyer with conditions in the contract. I have always assumed it is because he or she knows we will not be a potential customer again since we are leaving the area, and so the courtship for a future listing shifts to the buyer. Strange.

@ salti: True, that's why one needs to use actual local resources if one is interested in price at a specific locale.

However, in the context of the original topic, it's suffice to say, "Don't rely on Zillow for pricing for a specific buy/sale."

Our house was on the market for ten years. I would suggest finding the most honest and reliable real estate agent you can find. We lived in mid coast Maine and there were agents that would not drive one mile to our open houses because we were not listed with them. We never listed with another agent, and consistently reduced our price over the years. The crash truly affected our viewings along with the taxes in Maine. I also suggest negotiating the agents percentage, it worked for us. Have your agent give you all of the results of your viewings and inquiries from the national and local MLS listings, this was provided to us on a monthly basis.

You don't need to wonder if "I do" salti, if you can extrapolate. Obviously I didn't use one site since I was able to name so many. Of course, in addition to looking at websites, I had enough sense to weigh their valuations against what the city had as the worth of properties in the area. And what I valued the house, my realtor suggested, etc.

As far as the original question, I wish I would have had a crystal ball to better understand what my future hopes for utilization of my land would be. This kind of goes with the other question about land with restrictions, etc. I am in a semi-rural area, on 5 acres. My location within the town is pretty convenient for me at this time but being this close in somewhat limits what I might want to do in the future (such as goats) and the size of my chicken flock. However, I am not entirely sure that it would have changed our minds. If we had bought land farther out from our current location, the trade off would have been a longer commute, likely more issues with predators, instead of just deer in the garden perhaps antelope too and there would have been other things I could not plant because of bears. Still interesting to think what if.

Babbs wrote:

"Our house was on the market for ten years. I would suggest finding the most honest and reliable real estate agent you can find. We lived in mid coast Maine and there were agents that would not drive one mile to our open houses because we were not listed with them. We never listed with another agent, and consistently reduced our price over the years. The crash truly affected our viewings along with the taxes in Maine. I also suggest negotiating the agents percentage, it worked for us. Have your agent give you all of the results of your viewings and inquiries from the national and local MLS listings, this was provided to us on a monthly basis."

Maybe the agents did not want to waste their time looking at a severely overpriced home.

In my area, there's a premium on move-in ready homes because people are so busy, i.e. working long hours, dual careers. They are looking for houses that are nicely staged, current colors, think Pottery Barn, West Elm. Functionality of the kitchen is less important than its looks because most people order out or eat out many of their meals. Ditto HVAC, doors/windows, roof: People don't care too much if it's old as long as it works.

So, actually that is something I knew.

I appreciate all the many comments on here- but I guess I was hoping the thread would generate bits of wisdom and tips similar to what noscoccermom posted as opposed to the merits of different realtors and pricing venues. All are valid - but if I could plea midstream (or maybe if this doesnt work start another thread?).... a plea for more actual tips on appealing and marketing. maybe curb appeal for the interior as well.

One thing I think many people have a problem with in the curb appeal arena is they want to put their own flair on the house, rather than make it mainstream. Plain is better in this instance. Don't sink money into anything beyond making the house and yard clean. Neat and tidy are highly appealing.

When we sold our house in early summer, we spent about 200 bucks on Impatiens --- instant color.

I used twin sheets to create bedroom drapes (with clips). In fact, the buyers later asked why the window treatments weren't included (it wasn't in the contract), but, hey, I dropped off the sheets :)

Interior colors were all relatively light, pulled from the latest Pottery Barn/West Elm catalog. It was a starter home, so targeted buyer was a young professional couple.

Oh, and not sure whether it made a difference, but we used black and white photos of European cities on the walls.

I sold my house earlier this year in two days. The one thing that I think made the most difference was having the pictures taken by a professional photographer. My house looked absolutely beautiful online and we had fourteen showings on the second day it was listed (the first day we had a massive snowstorm and the roads were too treacherous. Otherwise we probably would have had an offer that day).

The one thing I wish I had known from the beginning was how emotional the experience would be. I really loved that house, I had only owned it for 2.5 years, I had just finished making it exactly the way I wanted it, and had expected to live there much longer. Once it was staged it was hard to feel it was still my house. I felt a little resentful of some of the changes my agent made, even thought I knew it was to help sell the house. I just had to think of the staging as a "costume", a marketing tool. My agent was part of a husband and wife team and they were wonderful. But it was very stressful.

Like others have said, professional photos. Not the agent with his or her iPhone. Our photographer came out on a sunny day. I told her "just tell me what you want done, I can take direction." I worked for her for over an hour and I didn't question anything. We listed on a Thursday afternoon. The appts started coming in immediately. Open house on Saturday was mobbed. House was sold by Sunday night.

Good weather that first weekend. The house looked like the photos. That was luck.

Price it properly. I was very personally invested because I had done all the work. I was a bit put off when the agent did Comps with other split levels as opposed to two stories. Right when we were doing the contract the agent agreed to put down my preferred listing price. But my spouse talked me out of it that night. We ended up listing for about 5% less than my ideal. But we had so much action we got offers a couple percent over asking. So it worked out.

The agent came with a stager a year before we listed. She gave us a list of things to do, painting etc, and we did them during the year.

Good luck.

I wish we had known to thoroughly check out the listing agent before committing. Finding out after the fact that we had hired a team, and that they were a comedy of errors was rather frustrating.

When you mention about the photographer- is it one you hired and paid for or did you stipulate with the realtor that you wanted better photos? I have heard this suggestion before and it makes sense.... and nosoccermom I think that tip about the black and white photos sounds good. not sure if it will work in my house but there are some rooms that are pretty bare with artwork and I suspect a few of those will go a long way....good idea.

/\/\/\ right.

You are not just selling a place to live in but a "life style". That's why model homes frequently have furniture that is above budget for the house and why you see golf clubs and tennis rackets, and trays with champagne :)

[As an aside: One place I looked at was empty but had rose petals and a tray with wine bottle and two glasses smack in the middle of the dirty BR carpet ---- and some lacy gown in the closet. I kid you not.]

That could have been a odd, questionable attempt at staging, or it could be that some of the realtors are using the place as their illicit love nest, and forgot to clean it up.

Well, it's the same realtor who uses it for all her listings. Which still leaves both your possibilities open :)

Sounds like the Realtor must have had good results from her "staging"