Should a Seller Reduce His Home Price Just because it hasn’t Sold Yet?

Many agents will tell you that the answer is simply “Yes”. Keep reducing the home until a buyer comes along and puts in an offer. This works for the most part in the lower priced market (they have a larger pool of buyers available to them), but for higher end homes, especially those priced above a million, reducing the home does not always sell it.

Expensive homes have always taken longer to sell. In fact the housing supply in the Twin Cities for homes priced above $1 Million is 40 months. For homes priced between $500,000-$1 Million it is 20 months. Are these sellers freaking out and reducing their homes to drastic levels just in order to sell. The answer is “No”. If anything, they take it off the market for a short period and give it a rest.

Now don’t get me wrong, there are times that price reductions are warranted. Some sellers are unrealistic about the market and overprice their homes. Then they refuse to reduce them, or negotiate when an offer comes in. They quickly become frustrated and take their homes off the market. Sometimes they blame the agent. But the truth is, the pool of buyers is much, much less in the luxury home market, so it naturally takes longer for a home to sell.

There are many buyers out there right now looking to buy a million dollar luxury home for nothing. They want to live the life, but not pay the price. Many sellers see right through them, and refuse to reduce their home’s price, or except a low ball offer. Even agents fail to understand how the upper bracket home system works. For that reason, make sure you work with a luxury specialist when buying or selling a home.

As a buyer, don’t rush to judge a high end home based on its market time. For the most part, market time doesn’t mean that much.

As a seller, don’t get discouraged about the market time for your home. If you can, stick to your guns and wait, a buyer will come along to buy your home!

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