It is possible to sell your home even in today’s market. The big question to ask yourself first, though, is whether you want to be “in” the market or “in” the market.

We’ll see…

There are many factors that contribute to the value of a home. Even so, the reality is that the seller only has control over two of those factors… Price and Condition. A seller cannot control the taxes, the seller cannot control the local school rating, the seller cannot control the lot size, etc. On the other hand, the seller has control over the price of the house as well as the state of the house.

As I heard him explain once during a real estate webinar, there are essentially three places you can be when selling your home…

1. In the market
2. No Man’s Land
3. In the market

If it’s “on the market,” it’s listed, but doesn’t get any showings or offers. So you’ll need to adjust your price or the condition of the home…or both.

If you’re getting submissions, but still not getting any offers, then you’ve entered what’s called No Man’s Land. To get out of no man’s land and really start getting offers, you’ll have to once again adjust the price of your home or the condition of your home…or both.

Where you really want to be is IN the market. You know you’re IN the market when you get shows and offers.

So the trick is to adjust your Price and Condition to position yourself IN the market. However, for most people, the reality is that it is much easier to adjust the price of the house than it is to adjust the condition of the house.

Now, if you really want to sell your home fast, the best approach is to price it less than 10% below comparative market value.

This approach often leads to multiple offers and therefore bidding wars that actually drive the price of your home back up. You see, once someone has mentally committed to buying a home and has already envisioned living there, they are much more likely to raise the price when they find out that someone else wants to buy their dream home.

Again, if you want to sell your home, you must be IN the market. The price of the house and the condition of the house are the only two factors that a seller has control over to position the house ON the market. To sell your home fast, we suggest making only minor improvements while focusing more on undervaluing your home to lead to more showings and more offers and quite possibly a bidding war.