Avoid the post holiday blues and sell your house now

Home sellers listing their home in between the months of Nov to Feb are placed in a unique situation. The holidays are around the corner and the housing market slows way down. If you find yourself in that situation consider the following three points listed below. 

Consider taking it off the market

•  Every day that your house is on the market is added to the cumulative total "days on market". Many buyers consider houses that have been on the market more than 90 days to be undesirable. 
• This naturally leads to the conclusion that there must be something wrong with it. Right or wrong this conclusion will lead most buyer to skip your house and keep looking. If you can’t afford to wait then you should price it to stand out from the crowd. If it sits through the holidays it will likely end up south of 90 days on the market. This will lead most people looking to skip right over your home in search of a newer listing. 

Be flexible with your showing times you may only get one chance 

• You typically only get one shot at most home buyers. This means that if you decline their showing request they are not likely to come back a second time. 
• During the holiday season sellers are notorious for declining showings because they have family in town or want to "enjoy the holidays". 
• While that is completely understandable, the buyer doesn't care what you have going on. They are looking to buy a house and if they cant see yours than there are plenty more out there that they can. This is not to say that you should accommodate unreasonable requests. Just make your home as available as you possible can.  Most people don't house hunt during the holidays out of enjoyment if they are searching they are probably pretty serious. Declined showings make it seem like you're not serious.

If your not going to do that then my first point is probably one you should strongly consider. 

Take it easy on the decorations

• Not everyone shares your taste in decorations so consider keeping the decorations to a minimum this year. You want to keep things as neutral as you can and holiday decorations are no exception.
•  If you are selling your home you want it to stay true to the pictures. If buyers are coming to see your home it is because they liked what they saw in the pictures so keep it true. If the buyers have to struggle to picture the house they saw in the pictures they will likely just move on. Buyers have short attention spans and judge the house on first impressions. So before you do any decorating think about what the first impression of the buyer will be when they see it. If it is going to hide any features that would be a selling point than it is probably best avoided. 

Out with the general and in with the specific

As some of you may have noticed the name of my blog has changed from "words to a younger me" to "Life lessons from a know-it-all in 500 words or less". I am always looking to improve and this blog is no exception. I wanted something that more adequately described what the blog was all about. I want to do three things with this blog: Impart lessons that I have learned, help you save time as well as money and lastly to give you home buying, selling or renting advise from my experience as a REALTOR®. 

• I want to impart lessons learned from the mistakes that I have made throughout my life. I will share many of the lessons that I wish I had learned when I was younger. I will cover a range of topics and you may not agree with all of them. If you disagree then please comment and let us start a dialogue about it. I will be the first to admit that I don’t know it all and I would welcome the opportunity to hear a readers opinion. 

• If there is one thing that I have learned it is that time is truly a finite resource and that it is truly the most valuable thing there is. The dilemma here is that you need money to live and that often is in exchange for you time. So I want to do my best to help you gain more of both, hopefully without having to sacrifice too much of either. 

• As you have probably figured out I am a REALTOR® by trade and as buying a home is one of the biggest purchases that anyone will ever make it can cost you lots of time and money. The sad reality is that not all REALTORS® are created equally and many don’t care about their clients interest as much as they should. We live in an age of information where anything you could want to know is a click away. This is to say that while you should trust your REALTOR®, if your uneasy about something then do some fact checking on your own. 

To wrap it all up, all three of these things are tied together. It is my sincere hope that you will take something away from each post. I don’t expect for everyone to agree with or find everything I say applicable, but if it helps just a few people then it is worth it. 

As a small caveat I want to promote myself. If you or anyone you know needs help buying, selling or renting a home in or around San Antonio then give me a call. If you are moving anywhere else in the country and need help still give me a call. I work with great agents all over the country and I can get you connected with someone that I trust. For more great information check out my Facebook,  Twitter or Pintrest pages, all are updated daily.