Posts Tagged ‘Intero Real Estate Services’

Intero Insider: Demand Grows Like a Weed After a Spring Rainstorm

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We’re well into the spring home-buying season and the latest numbers for March are out to help us gauge how the 2012 real estate market is faring. The verdict is that we’re settling into a stable pattern of growth as monthly existing home sales have trended above year-ago levels for nine consecutive months.

However, there’s another interesting thing that’s happening. While year-over-year sales volume is up, there was a drop in March from February. The reason? National Association of Realtors Chief Economist Lawrence Yun notes that inventory levels are low, creating a situation in which there aren’t enough homes for sale to satisfy demand from buyers.

Total existing home sales declined 2.6% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.48 million in March from February, but were 5.2% above the 4.26 million-unit pace in March 2011, according to NAR’s report. Meanwhile, housing inventory declined 1.3% in March to 2.37 million existing homes for sale. Listed inventory is 21.8% below a year ago.

There’s no exact answer to why inventory has dropped so much. But we can infer that the shrinking foreclosure rate is contributing to a lack of properties on the market, as well tepid sellers playing the waiting game. If you don’t have to sell right now and you’re in a slower market or traumatized from the declining state of the last few years, then you’re likely staying put and waiting out the market until there are clear signs of an upswing.

In addition, buying conditions are so stellar in many markets right now  - with extremely attractive interest rates and home prices – that demand is growing like a weed after a spring rain! NAR says that many of its members have reported a definite increase in “foot traffic” to see listings and open houses And we recently covered how some markets are back in bidding-war situations. So the signs are good, folks!

Another solid factor in the spring home-buying season this year is the 2.5% year-over-year increase in median sales price at $168,800. Additionally, distressed homes accounted for a smaller portion of sales in March (29%) than they did in February (34%) and in the same month a year ago (40%) – indicating that the distressed portion of the market is steadily shrinking.

The facts are in and it’s clear the real estate market is no longer a clear punching bag for economic ailments. We’re building momentum that appears to be built on a strong foundation – not just temporary home-buying tax credits and other federal initiatives. Spread the word!


The Luxury Insider: The Truth About International Marketing of Luxury Homes

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I am in a very good mood this morning, just reflecting on the facts & figures that I saw on a giant screen while attending the “Leading Companies of the World Conference” in Orlando a couple of weeks ago. ”LeadingRE,” as it is known in the professional circles, is Intero’s bridge to qualified high end buyers all over the globe. It is our partner in the ever important mission to successfully market luxury homes in 2012 and the years to come. Intero and LeadingRE, that’s a pretty formidable combination!

A few blogs back, I wrote about the need to open the marketing window to all states and all continents to optimize our chances of reaching out to all prospective high end buyers. At a time when the percentage of out-of-area, and especially foreign buyers, represents a huge and growing share of the demand for unique properties, global exposure is hardly an option. Doing without it may end up costing a seller over 50% of the likely buyers, possibly the highest bidders and probably cash buyers. It could also be the difference between selling and not selling.

To be honest, I am amazed that some sellers of pricey homes still defy the odds when they choose to list their property with a small brokerage with little or no access to the right buyers, here and there and everywhere. Who can afford to take that chance?

With this said, let me give you a better sense of the power of Leading RE and its upscale division: The Luxury Portfolio. First, their mission: give listing exposure to the largest sphere of international buyers & sellers. The way they do it is quite simple: associate and network with the finest, most reputable and powerful group of brokers in the industry, anywhere.

The results are spectacular. Judge for yourselves; In 2011, Luxury Portfolio won, again, the leading market share of all global high end residential properties, with 11,594 such properties. Behind us, we want to give credit to the usual competitors: Sotheby’s (10,072 properties), Christie’s (7,498) and Coldwell Banker Previews (4,671). Of course the list of brokers goes on with a host of other brands but I will save some ink since they hardly register on this radar.

Perhaps even more important to our sellers is the fact that Luxury Portfolio is the purveyor of the most relevant segment of upscale properties, which is what it’s all about. Look at these numbers:

• 84% of The Luxury Portfolio homes are listed above $1Million. This is to be compared to…
• 57% only of such properties (over $1M) for Coldwell Banker Previews
• 41% only of such properties for Sotheby’s.

Just a few more bullets to add to the above show of power and effectiveness:

• The Luxury Portfolio has a total inventory of….$40Billion
• The average price of a home is….$2,535,000. That’s a lot considering that in many countries you can buy better than a hand full of luxury homes with a check of this size.
• Luxury Portfolio has listings in 27 countries and 45 US states.
• We market to buyers all over the world. The advertising program reached over 47million targeted luxury consumers. Visitors came from 22 different countries.

As I said in a previous blog: real estate firms may be created equal but they sure don’t evolve the same way and at the same speed. Given the choice, it is obviously safer and more meaningful to trust your listing with a company that can deliver on the promises.

PS. Quick heads up to our franchisees and friends out there in the US and abroad: if you have reliable info/data about the high end real estate market in your major city, region, state or country, please forward. We want to be as relevant as possible in terms of the topics we choose to write about and the accuracy of the information that you want to read in order to list, buy or sell exceptional real estate. I cannot promise we will use your info, but we certainly thank you in advance for whatever precious input you may provide.


The Intero Insider: Mitt Romney Eyes Mortgage-Interest Deduction

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Throughout the economic downturn and recovery, we’ve seen the topic of the mortgage-interest deduction come up time and again. It’s fitting that Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney would bring it up this week as millions of Americans are frantically filing income taxes to avoid being late.

In a speech on Sunday, Romney said he’s considering eliminating the mortgage-interest deduction for second homes for high-income individuals. This often comes up with politicians and congressional groups as a viable option for creating more revenue for the federal government.

Let’s first look at the number of homes and owners this might affect. The National Association of Realtors estimates that second homes – including vacation and investment properties – accounted for 38% of home sales in 2011. The group said that about half a million vacation homes and 1.2 million investment properties were sold last year, continuing a trend in which these homes have accounted for the largest chunk of sales since 2005.

Generally speaking, eliminating or making changes to the mortgage-interest deduction is not going to have a great impact on the housing market. While the government may reap some rewards in the form of more cash made via taxation, most homeowners and first-time buyers still see the deduction as an important perk or benefit of owning a home. Messing with this deduction now at a time when the recovery is still quite fragile and slow would be a bad idea.

Eliminating or scaling back the mortgage-interest deduction would hit states in which vacation homes are most popular harder than others. Florida, Maine, Michigan and Colorado could see fewer sales as a result.

Moreover, more buyers have been jumping in the market and buying investment properties in recent years. Sales of investment properties spiked 64% last year. These are properties that otherwise may not have been purchased, which makes a pretty big case for keeping all incentives in place for investors to continue buying, and therefore aiding the housing recovery along.

While some say that the mortgage-interest deduction isn’t as big a deal for second home buyers because of the emotional nature of those purchases, I’m leery of mucking up a homeownership perk that’s long been held as a great benefit to owning a home. If incentives like this are working to keep investors hungry for real estate – and that hunger in turn is helping the market as a whole – then let’s back off and find another way to fix our fiscal mess.


The Luxury Insider: Alert: Sellers Wanted!

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If you own a high end home in Silicon Valley and you are considering selling your property at some point in the near future, I have a question for you: what exactly are you waiting for?

Please understand. My question is totally earnest: no tricks, no ulterior motive. I would love to know what is actually causing you to delay putting your property on the market. I am sure you have a good reason; I am just curious as to what the reason is.

You see, I am a little puzzled because, from my point of observation, it seems like the right time to sell. If you are in the San Francisco Peninsula, the South Bay and much of the East Bay, the market is buzzing, particularly in the million dollar range. You list a property one day and there is a good chance that it will be gone in a matter of days if the price is within shooting range. There is also a good chance that a few would-be buyers will fight over it since there is so little inventory available to be sold.

The MLS stats reflect the fact that new sales are outnumbering active listings about 2 to 1. Looking at the number of multiple offers on homes priced between $1M and $2M, you would have to conclude that you have 3 buyers for each home. I am not surprised that buyers are coming out of the woodwork in masses after years of economic slowdown. This is clearly shown in a recent NAR study which points to the fact that in 2011, “typical sellers” sold their home after 9 years, while between 2001 and 2006, the sellers’ tenure in a home was only 6 years. That can only further exacerbate the pent up demand phenomenon.

So, no surprise there. What does surprise me is the fact that so few sellers are taking advantage of the opportunity this above reality is offering them on a silver plate. Hence my original question: if you are thinking about selling, why not now?

Let me list a few reasons, pertinent or not, to try to guess what yours might be, and then I will give you my take:
• Prices are just starting to go up; I don’t want to rush selling if it ends up costing me plenty in potential appreciation over the next few months…..
AP: OK, I hear you, you may not lose much by waiting, unless of course you are buying up, in which case your argument is working against you: the more expensive property you are looking to buy will logically appreciate more & faster than the one you need to sell.
• When Facebook’s IPO strikes in May, a crowd of jackpot winners will pay a lot more for my home….
AP: Perhaps but I hate gambling on future bonanza since much of the fuzz about forthcoming IPO’s has been in the news for months and the real estate values correction has already been integrated in today’s prices. There is not one single listing on the market which does not reflect this anticipation.
• I read that next year the market might be even stronger….
AP: We’ll see. Nobody knows. To be honest with you, I too thought a few months ago that 2013 would be a dandy. I still kind of feel that way but I don’t know anymore whether it is because I successfully convinced myself or because I have objective tangible indicators proving the point. The fact is the economy is so manipulated by politics these days that you just cannot smell the market more than 6 months at a time.
• Mortgage money may get even cheaper….
AP: I don’t buy that one. It would be more reasonable to assume that if the rates move this year, it will be in the other direction.
• I would love to sell but It’s awfully tough to find the right home to buy and then to move quickly before another bidder snaps it!…
AP: I know, and that’s the whole point of what I am saying. We need a lot more listings to choose from to satisfy the demand. Is it likely to happen? Well, a lot more new properties are going to hit the market in April & May but…a lot more buyers will be in line to get them. No change really. The market is what it is. Persistence leads to winning.

Conclusion (strictly from my perspective): if you wish to sell and buy something else, do it. You may not find and buy the perfect home in the perfect location and at the perfect price, but you know what? Nobody does, irrespective of the market. Love is rarely at first sight.


The Intero Insider: Spring Has Sprung for Housing Markets

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Spring is in the air – especially for real estate markets. I’ve always felt like the personal stories and anecdotes I hear from agents who are on the ground and working with buyers and sellers say much more about the state of the market than statistics, which are often time lagging and misleading.

This spring, the agents I talk to are busy – beyond belief it seems. They’re seeing multiple offers, pre-recession inventory levels, and a general thirst for real estate from consumers.

But the stats aren’t too shabby either. Another great piece of news we saw come out recently was a look at the market for second homes and investment properties in 2011. Investment home sales surged 64.5% to 1.23 million in 2011 from 749,000 in 2010, while vacation home sales rose 7% to 502,000 in 2011 from 469,000 in 2010 (according to the National Association of Realtors’ annual survey).

Overall, vacation home purchases accounted for 11% of all transactions last year, up from 10% in 2010, while investment sales jumped to 27% last year from 17% the year before. The shift is good news for real estate markets because it shows the market is able to absorb the foreclosures hitting the market.

That’s what some of the stats are saying. What do the agents say?

As I mentioned, most that I talk to are super busy. They tell me that markets where jobs have been picking up and where inventory is at a healthy level are doing very well. However, the pockets of neighborhoods that were overdeveloped for the most part are still struggling to absorb inventory.

This all points to a good spring for buyers and sellers. The tech-heavy economies like ours in Silicon Valley are benefiting from extraordinary job markets in which big standout companies like Zynga and Facebook are growing like weeds, hiring and enjoying new IPOs.

Spring historically has always been a great season for real estate, but this one feels even better as we hear anecdotes and statistics working in the same direction. There’s a turning point happening. And although many still argue we’re in a mostly jobless recovery, those who are lucky enough to be in areas where the economy is picking up are doing just fine. (Don’t get me wrong, though – those who are in badly hit areas that aren’t recovering as easily are still struggling and we need to acknowledge that.)

Americans are back in the real estate frame of mind.


The Luxury Insider: The Best of the Best are Doing Well…..

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The results are in for the most successful real estate agents in 2011. The Wall Street Journal and REAL Trends just published the summary they compiled of the best professionals in the US. If you think that last year was a miserable year in the residential real estate business, you are right…If you think that it was bad for all Realtors, you are mistaken. Judging by the astronomical numbers they put on the books (not to mention their checking account), the top guns did OK.

There is something like 1,000,000 Realtors in the country. Big business. Believe it or not, the roster shrank 25% since the high mark of 2007, the year when the slide began. Somehow, the best agents adjust, adapt, survive and often thrive in the worst years. They did it again in 2011.

Consider this: Last year, according to the study, the top 250 agents managed to sell an aggregate of over $15 billion. Numero Uno in 2011, the king of the place, sold an astonishing $279,841,487! A top gun from New York. He is good! Agent #250 on this select list sold a comfortable $35 million +. In between the two, we note that 5 agents sold over $200M, 28 sold over $100M and 129 sold in excess of $50M. Who said it was a bad year? Grant me the pleasure to note also that 5 Intero top guns made the list of the best of the best (only commercial in the text…).

As usual, the vast majority of the winners are high end specialists, listing and selling multi-million dollar luxury homes to the few citizens of the world who can afford them. It is no surprise then that they work in the priciest areas in the country, on the West Coast and the East Coast.

Two states alone account for 60% of the top 250 agents in the country, the usual suspects you might say: California and New York. 150 of the 250 work there for a living. California ranks number 1 as a state with 99 super heroes, distributed almost equally between Southern California (51) and Northern California (48), home of the hot Silicon Valley. New York follows with 51 of the best pros in the business.

With 2012 shaping up to be a vintage year in the residential industry, particularly at the top end of the market, I can guarantee that the numbers are going to go through the roof. I also would bet that, with the exception of a handful, the winners this year will be the same agents who claimed top honors last year. That’s how it goes in the real estate business: the best are getting better. Places are expensive at the top. Newcomers can earn their ticket to the top but they will have to associate with the top firms and work their tails off. What’s new?


The Intero Insider: Bidding Wars Are Back

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Bidding wars. These horror stories/glorious situations (depending on which side of the deal you were on) were abundant in the years leading up to the top of the housing market in 2006. Then the phrase slipped out of consciousness – and reality – for most markets in the last few years. And now, amidst a slow and tough-as-nails housing recovery, these situations are back.

Is this the tipping point we’ve been waiting for? A story that ran on Bloomberg last week seems to suggest that yes, it is the tipping point in the markets that are seeing multiple bids. And these markets also happen to be the ones with strong underlying economies.

What markets are we talking about? Silicon Valley, for one. And across the country, bidding wars have been noted in Seattle, Miami and Washington, D.C., according to Bloomberg.

What’s driving the voracious interest in homes in these markets is a combination of a six-year low inventory, an increase in jobs and increased affordability brought on by a handful of years of falling prices. In fact, it’s now more affordable to buy than to rent in many of these markets.

The housing market is bouncing back in these markets. That’s great news for sellers, owners and the local economies. But what about the buyers? Well, it’s certainly an incentive to get off the fence and make a move. If you’ve been waiting for prices to drop even further in these pivotal markets, you likely waited too long.

However, a positive side effect of the presence of bidding wars is that it can also spur homeowners who’ve been on the sidelines to finally jump in the market and list their homes for sale, increasing the local inventory. So it’s not as if the market is suddenly going to tip back to a boom frenzy.

The biggest takeaway for me in this latest trend of bidding wars is that it is the perfect example of the cyclical nature of housing markets, which gives me a positive view on the future. For every boom, there is a come down and for every lull there is a corresponding bounce back. That’s just the way supply and demand works.

We can feel confident knowing that homeownership is still embedded in the American life. We know that an unfavorable housing market leads to a hot rental market, which creates upward pressure on prices there and eventually leads renters to again fuel their desire to own.

Like all great things in life, it takes time. But we’re getting there. It’s going to be an exciting spring for real estate!


Luxury Insider: Open House in the High End?

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I often hear from both home sellers and real estate agents that it is neither appropriate nor recommended to hold an open house for the public if the subject property is a multi-million dollar luxury home. In fact I heard the comment so much over the years that I almost got to the point of believing it! Well, I still don’t, generally speaking.

Before I dig deep into the arguments which may be used to validate one side or the other, let me state clearly that I understand the difference between an estate-quality property and a more standard home. I made a good living understanding and leveraging such difference. The marketing strategy and scope are indeed altogether different because we are not dealing with the same buyers, in terms of means and needs. That’s why Intero has a “Prestigio” Division, by the way.

However, if we agree to keep things simple, we will probably agree that, irrespective of means and needs, buyers, in all price ranges, are…buyers. They share the same emotions and desires. The same thing can be said of sellers. Principals, on either side, always appreciate when we make their objective easily achievable.

If they wish to sell, their chances of winning largely depend on the number of prospective buyers who get to see the house. If they wish to buy, their chances of finding the right home largely depend on the opportunities they have to access and visit any given property. That is of course the value of the open house option.  It is easy: buyers can look at various homes, with or without the family, whenever they have a little time and when they are in the mood.

Of course Realtors are best to guide buyers through the maze of options and explain the pros & cons of each location and property. Still, sometimes it is fine to stroll around town, relaxed, and do home shopping as we do window shopping in a mall. My wife loves to do both!

So what’s wrong, if anything, about an open house in the high end?

Here is a list of the legitimate arguments being presented by the critics or the skeptics, followed by the counter-arguments, whether legitimate or not:

  • “It makes no sense to have an open house in my price range” – Maybe it does not but we should not disqualify the option. The open house could very well be attended by…wealthy people too.
  • “My house is way too large to be held open” – If it is too big for one agent, it might not be for two agents. If pertinent, we can plan for three agents to be present.
  • “I would rather have my agent welcome visitors and show them the house” – Sure, and this is exactly what is likely to happen, but this preference should not necessarily eliminate the open house option.
  • “I don’t want undesirable people to see my house” – This one is a little tougher since we cannot judge people on a quick look. A wealthy friend of mine was prevented one day from  entering The Ritz (where he had a room for the week) in Paris because he wore jeans! .. He canceled his reservation…  Of course, on the seller’s advice and his consent, we can demand name, contact info and even proof of identity to visitors whenever needed.
  • “I have too many valuables” – When a house is for sale, whether open or not over the weekend, there are elementary precautions to take to reduce or avoid altogether the risk of a visitor stealing pricey objects.  Anything small and of great value, such as jewelry or art should not be offered to the eyes, they should be under lock or in a different place.

The open house option adds a new dimension to the marketing of a property. Many homes, regardless of price, sell on open house or as a direct result of an open house. This option needs to be discussed with the agent on a case by case basis and never arbitrarily be discarded. Good luck.


Intero Insider: Who’s Buying?

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Here in the Bay Area, the answer to the question “who’s buying homes?” seems to be a resounding “employees of all the hot tech companies” – Facebook, Zynga, Google, Oracle, Apple – the usual suspects. Yes, we are indeed blessed with a deep economy that seems to be creating many more jobs than you see being created in other parts of the country.

When it comes to the nation as a whole, the answer to who’s buying right now is mostly investors and first-time buyers. According to the National Association of Realtors’ latest monthly housing statistics, investors purchased 23% of homes in February, up from 20% the same month a year ago and unchanged from January. Meanwhile, first-time buyers accounted for 32% of purchases in February, down from 34% the same month a year ago and 33% in January.

Where are they buying?

Sales were up across the country in February compared to the same month a year earlier. However, not all regions saw increases from the previous month.

At the regional level, the Midwest came out on top in February (which is unexpected, given that it’s the middle of winter – typically not a favored time to buy or sell a home). Existing-home sales were up 13.3% in February from a year ago to a pace of 1.02 million. Sales were up 1% from January, and the median price in the Midwest was $120,500.

In the South, sales were 9.3% higher than a year ago, and .6% higher than January at an annual pace of 1.77 million. The median price in the region was $138,100.

Here in the West, existing-home sales were 6.1% higher in February than a year ago, but were down 3.2% from January to an annual pace of 1.22 million. The median price in the region was $195,300.

In the Northeast, sales were up 5.5% from a year ago, but fell 3.3% from January to an annual level of 580,000 in February. The media price in the Northeast was $225,800.

What are they buying?

The Realtor group said that all-cash sales increased to 33% of transactions in February, which leads us to believe that a third of buyers may be buying investment properties since investors account for the bulk of cash transactions.

Of the February sales, single-family home sales were 9.4% higher than a year ago, but 1% lower than in January. Existing condo and co-op sales were 3.9% higher than a year ago, but unchanged from January.

What can we surmise from all these statistics? The important takeaway is that this year is starting off stronger in most regions than last year. In fact, February – historically a weaker month of the year for home sales – seems to be acting much like spring in terms of the strong pace of sales. Remember: slow and steady is the name of this recovery. So far, the numbers support that prognostication.


The Luxury Insider: Pricing Tactics…Or the Art of Juggling with a Grenade

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One of the oldest and still challenging question both home sellers and their listing agents dread the most (aside from the commission issue…) is “What price should we put on the listing to produce the best price in the end?” You all have been there before, right? Most of you did fine; many did not and wished they had used a very different approach, if only they had known; if only they were given another chance.

The choices have always been and will always be the same:

  • Overprice
  • Underprice
  • Price at what is perceived to be “market value”

The problem with this question is that there is no magic recipe that works every time. It depends on the market, it depends on the property and it depends on the marketing. Let’s look at the three options and briefly analyze the pros & cons of each one.

  1. Overpricing: Hard to define what is an overpriced listing. As far as I am concerned, an overpriced listing is one that does not sell!  In other words, a property is not “overpriced” if a buyer buys it, even if we thought it was when we put the For Sale sign in the front lawn. The supply & demand dance can do strange things in a good market. Want an example? Look at what happened in the Silicon Valley over the last 3 months: very little inventory, huge pent up demand, cheap mortgage money, reassuring economic news, more stable job market, rich IPO’s on the horizon, etc. Results: in the mid range of the market, around $1M+, selling prices probably jumped 5 to 10%. It means that if a home was listed in January 5/7% over what we considered to be a “reasonable” price, it could have sold at full price in March. Now, before you get too carried away, let’s use a little wisdom that only experience can provide. In the real estate business, the past is not necessarily a good guide to predict the future. It is not because prices have jumped yesterday that we can count on the same thing tomorrow. What we can say, looking backwards, is that if a house in that region has been on the market more than a month and did not sell yet, chances are it is indeed overpriced. Overpricing, in any market, is a dangerous idea. In my book, it is a terrible idea and entirely counter productive. If and when the property sells, after repeated price drops, it almost always ends up selling for less than otherwise it would have, had the price been more realistic from the start. If the market is hot but the house does not move quickly, it will soon grow old and collect dust, as Realtors will always prefer showing new listings rather than those which have been aging on the shelves. So much for overpricing. Your choice.
  2. Underpricing: Talk about dangerous games!… You must have a strong heart to deal with this option. It can work to the sellers’ benefit, occasionally. It can hurt just as well. In the hot market we have been enjoying for a little while in the Silicon Valley and many other markets throughout  the US, underpricing is getting to be as popular (and risky) as bungee jumping. The idea is to tease anxious buyers with a price 5 to 10% lower than what we perceive to be the market price and manufacture a bidding war which will result in multiple offers and ultimately a sales price well over the asking and over what we thought the house would normally sell for. Some agents make a good living (for the time being) advising their clients to take a chance with such tactic. They may even draw some pride and good PR from the fact that their listings routinely sell at a higher price. That, of course, is a bit deceptive since it is a deliberate strategy designed to accomplish exactly that. Keep in mind that underpricing does not guarantee a higher price. It could go the other way. You might get stuck with a low price and no good offer. You could also have an appraisal problem, depending on the financing, because of the resulting inflated price. Do I favor this option? No. I just don’t like to play games. Your choice.
  3. Pricing at “market”: If you, as a home seller or as an agent, think you know at what price a buyer and a seller are likely to come to terms, in any market, because you have a bunch of reliable comps (recent local sales of similar properties, active listings…), I suggest you use that option rather than play with a grenade. You may put a tiny cushion on top of the price to allow for possible negotiation. If the price is too high, you will soon know and you will trim the excess fat right away. If the price is too low, well, you may benefit from an unintended buyers’ frenzy. If the price is right, you will likely obtain a quick & easy sale. A win-win. I like that scenario and I bet you do too. We all sleep better when we do it this way. Again, your choice.