You are in love with the place, worked hard to improve it but your Maine home is not selling.
What’s up with that? Is it really just the price is too high? And you picked the absolute worst wrong colors at the local paint store? So quick like a bunny. Hop to it. Change just two things. Price. Colors. Done.
Really, that’s all that’s holding up my Maine real estate sale?
Chisel away at the house list price. Tone down the Mopar high performance color intensity and voila.
Get the “sale pending” real estate home sign rider ready.
Like a baby, gonna have one any minute now. Stick around. Here comes a home sale buyer contract.
So right house price and play it safe easy on the eye colors, oh and maybe a little staging.
That’s how to hit the real estate house sale trifecta? Cool. I just can start filling the beefed up heavy cardboard packing boxes.
And quickly check to see if any new house listings popped up overnight in the Multiple Listing Service MLS feed.
Gotta hustle. Time to start making offers to find my next new home address.
The reasons your Maine home is not selling.
How much time do you have?
This Maine real estate blog post drills down into what impacts how long your home lingers on the local market.
Many factors work in your favor or against you in a home sale in Maine. (Any agent in another real estate market location has their own different advice to share because it is not one size fits all for the country.)
Days on market, a high DOM number is your primary indicator something is drastically wrong.
Nothing says “ten foot pole marks” to potential home buyers than the bloated DOM statistic problem indicator.
What’s wrong with this house, why is it still on the market and what am I missing?
Why is my Maine home not selling?
Like unclaimed luggage circling round and round the carousel long after all the tired passengers leave the airport terminal. Left behind, abandoned, cold, lonely, unloved.
The buyers jump to the conclusion the home has major problems.
Has to be something wrong. Not sure just what but just a deep dark suspicion something mechanical, very expensive needs repair.
Stay away from this one.
Must be the roof, foundation, heating, electrical or plumbing all messed up in that one.
Heck, could be haunted. (Wait a minute. Doesn’t that make it worth more?)
Keep your distance seems prudent based on absolutely not enough information, the wrong reaction to the DOM.
Every home for sale unless new construction is a “used house”.
They are not perfect, not all the same. Most home buyers have a price range to stay within or it’s keep renting the roof over their head.
So it’s always a do the best you can with the current local housing inventory you have available in any market. Feast, famine, inbetween supply situations unless you are brave enough for new construction, to build a house in Maine.
Buyers, try not to be too picky or seek perfection.
Sellers. the current market comparable houses sales like your place are priced here and you want to get double or triple that?
Real estate agents, please tell the homeowner with all due respect, you cannot meet their price point expectations.
Don’t clutter the market with hopelessly over priced house listings that are not going to sell.
You cannot always help them get a seat at the long shiny real estate conference room closing table.
It’s not the house is good or bad. It’s more about the motivation of the buyer, seller and even the real estate agent.
(Or a simple hidden title problem discovered late in the sale. Maybe a just surfacing boundary line dispute with a hostile neighbor.
Learning the rental tenant is not leaving but digging in to force a drawn out legal eviction process that costs a home listing sale.)
What does the buyer bring to the real estate listing sale equation?
Make sure you are pre-approved at a local Maine mortgage lending bank first.
Clean up any pesky issues stuck on your credit report before falling in love with the home of your dreams that you can not buy today.
If a house for sale goes under contract with a buyer that is NOT already bank approved, the days on market time suck trap starts.
Tied up so no one can buy it while maybe the buyer does or does not get the green light thumbs up approval.
If that buyer gets denied for lending, back on the market the house goes. Which makes house seekers wonder what’s wrong with the property listing? I thought it was gone, on it’s way to a closing?
I instruct, coach every Maine home buyer once they are bank approved, under contract to buy a house, don’t make any major purchases.
If you car dies, hitchhike. Do no increase your debt ratios. Stay away from charging a purchase for that new living room or master bedroom furniture set. Those added monthly payments means you were qualified but not home loan approved to buy anymore.
It goes without saying not to lose your job, not to change professions or get served with divorce papers. That all has to wait until the day after the closing if you want to stay bank approved.
What does a seller do or not do that impacts the sale price or getting to a real estate closing at all?
Price the property in line with the local current real estate market. De-clutter and deep clean room by room. Up in the attic, down in the basement, out in the garage too.
A little sprucing up with a paint brush where chips happened, washing windows, getting rid of cat boxes. Replacing dead light bulbs all helps the presentation. So does not delaying showings. If the house is rented, the difficulty finding a suitable time for the tenant can miss home selling opportunities.
What about the Maine real estate broker agent?
He or she is the lead reindeer. Lighting the way from pre-listing to the final real estate clear to close memo and passing the house keys.
Communicating through day and night to keep buyers and sellers meeting their responsibilities. Pivoting around obstacles, meeting deadlines along the way to keep the home sale on track.
Everything is time sensitive in real estate contract sales. Buyers and sellers can not wait forever.
Other attractive house sale situations come and go and real estate home sellers, house buyers get testy.
Lots of advice coming at them from hairdressers and brother in laws who think they know a little something about real estate listing sales.
Buyers and sellers pull the plug and move on if the sale is getting too emotional, is dragging out for lots very good reasons.
If the real estate agent does not make or answer phone calls, text messages or emails. That MIA agent can actually hurt the sale, stall the process from neglect of duties.
That’s it, that simple. As long as everyone does their role mentioned above another successful house sale happens? I just explained the roles of buyer, seller and real estate professional and how to assure a successful sale if followed?
Heck no. What happens in the local economy, the size of the housing inventory of houses just like yours that hop on the market to compete for buyers. That impacts house sales, the days on market DOM statistic.
Like sailing, adjusting the canvas to harness what wind you have is needed.
To quickly tack. The right moves, certain adjustments are easy to make when the real estate professional has been through several years of on the job training experience.
The real estate marketing is everything.
If only a sign planted in the front lawn, the house has very limited exposure. Today more than ever your house needs better story telling descriptions, imagery, video. Your real estate buyer is very busy and living an overbooked exhaustive life.
That wannabee home buyer looking for a place just like yours needs to know about your listing.
If he cannot find it out in a wider, larger audience of home buyers, if he does not know about it. Well now, it’s like winking at a woman in the dark. Gets very poor results.
Over pricing, poor condition, lack of exposure, stale weak marketing, difficulty in quick showings, an untrained brand new agent, a rotting out should retire older one.
All of these factors hurt your chances for a quick profitable hassle-free house purchase sale.
They each have a role in why a house fails to attract buyers and hangs around the local Maine real estate market
Go online and study real estate listing presentations.
AI slop in real estate is not helping the sea of sameness.
If everything starts to blur and look the same, your place deserves way better than that.
To stand out and get serious attention, the real estate marketing has to pull them in from the curb.
Real estate full motion video with sound is the best way to give buyers open house on demand showings around the clock.
How blogging and social media on a daily basis helps the real estate marketing momentum, reach and exposure.
If you are thinking of buying or selling a home, any kind of property, I would love to talk with you.
What’s your real estate puzzle and let’s hear the questions that I can help give advice from past listing sale adventures.
I love this real estate profession, but admit the learning curve has not stopped over the entire 45 years of all kinds of experiences.
You have to have fire in your belly, keep studying and be willing to embrace new ways to do my job better.
You have to feel like you can’t wait to begin another new Maine real estate day.
I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker
207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |
MOOERS REALTY 69 North Street Houlton Maine 04730 USA