How to Sell Your Home in 24 Hours

Has your home been on the market for a while? Are you not getting any showings? Maybe you are getting showings but no offers. I will show you how to sell your home and sell it quickly. These tips work if you are selling it yourself (FSBO) or if you are using a Realtor.

Obviously, if you are in a hot real estate market, you shouldn?t have any trouble selling your home. The tips here can help you sell it for more, but this article is primarily for those in a more competitive market who are having trouble selling their home. It?s for those in either a slow or medium market with plenty of homes for sale. Those are the ones who will benefit most from this article.

First, we need to determine how serious you are about selling your home. Are you a short term, medium term or a long term seller? A long term seller:

• Is in no rush to sell their home, or
• Doesn?t care if they sell it or not, or
• Wants the absolute top price for their home

Do you remember the movie ?Sixth Sense?? The kid in that movie could see dead people. Some of the dead people didn?t know they were dead. The thing about long term sellers is that some of them don?t know that they are a long term seller. They will tell you they want to sell their home, but they won?t do what it takes to sell their home. It?s a Realtor?s nightmare. If you are a long term seller, forget about selling your home quickly. It won?t happen. That?s why it?s called ?long term? seller.

It helps a home to sell if it has good street appeal, is clean and uncluttered, and in a good neighborhood. But what if there are 2 or 3 of those on the same street, or 500 of those in the same city? With all other things being equal, the reason one home sells and another does not, is price.

I have seen homes come onto the market and get accepted offers within just hours of being listed. And this was not in a particularly hot market. They weren't really outstanding homes either. But they had a great price and home buyers want a good deal.

The title of this article is ?How to Sell Your Home in 24 Hours?. Catchy title, huh? It got your attention didn?t? it? The reality is that there is a price at which your home will sell within 24 hours. You may not like that price, but it will sell. The point I am trying to make is if you really want to sell your home, you must take serious measures to make it more attractive than similar homes on the market. That may include lowering the price to a number that you don?t particularly like.

So how serious are you? How motivated are you? I?ve see some sellers switch Realtors like they were flipping pancakes. They kept hoping the next one would have that special touch to sell their home. They thought there was some magic formula that would get them the top-price offer they wanted. And, if your home is a FSBO, you have another hurdle to overcome. You are probably not getting the exposure needed to make you home competitive in the market. To be competitive, your home must have good exposure and be a better choice in some way than similar homes on the market.

The driving force of the housing market is supply and demand. In fact, it?s the driving force of any market. It doesn?t matter if it?s the housing market, the stock market, or the commodities market. Why are gas prices so high? What determines the price of a bag of sugar? Why is one stock price higher than another? Why does one 3 bedroom, 2 bath 2,000 square foot home in one neighborhood cost five times as much as one across town? Why does an electrician charge more for re-wiring your home today than he quoted a year ago (copper prices)? It?s about supply and demand.

If there are more homes on the market than there are buyers for them, it?s called a buyers market. They have more choices. The supply of homes is larger than the demand for them. But there are things you can do to make your home a more attractive choice for available buyers.

• Good street appeal. Keep your grass mowed. Do some landscaping. Plant bushes and flowers. Trim bushes and trees. Put on a fresh coat of paint outside if needed. Make it look appealing. Make people want to come into your home.
• Get rid of the clutter. Make it look spacious. Not just the rooms but the closets and kitchen cabinets as well. People like a home with a lot of storage space.
• Keep it clean. Mop. Dust. Straighten. Clean the carpets. Keep the cat litter box clean.
• Do any needed repairs.
• Paint inside if necessary
• Give it some decorating touches There are some inexpensive decorating techniques you can learn and apply. Browse some of the home magazines. Watch some of the TV shows about the home. Visit some open houses in your area and see what others have done.

But if you do all of this and your home still isn?t selling, it?s time to take a serious look at the price of your home. It may be overpriced. This is where a Realtor can really help you. Get the comps (comparable sales) of homes in your area. When appraisers and Realtors calculate the value of a home, they determine the price per square foot that similar homes sold for in your area. So obviously, you can?t just look at the total price of a home if it is a different size than yours. If a neighbor sells their home for $200,000 and it?s 2,000 square feet, that?s $100 per square foot. If other homes in your area are also selling for $100 per square foot, then you know what yours is worth. Just multiply the square foot of your home by $100. If your home is 2,200 square feet, and everything else is equal, your home is worth about $220,000. This is a simplistic explanation because there are some variations, but it is generally accurate. For a more accurate valuation, pay for a professional appraisal.

Your Realtor can give you a pretty good idea of the price range of homes in your area. For instance, they may find that homes in your area have sold in the $97 - $103 per square foot range, thus an average of $100. If homes have sold in the $97 - $103 range, they were probably listed (and are listed) in the $100 - $106 range. By using this price range, if you price your home at $106 per square foot (or higher), you probably won?t get much activity. If you price it at $100 per square foot you will probably get a fair amount of activity. But if you price it at $97 (or lower) per square foot, you will probably get a lot of activity. The advantage of aggressive pricing is that it may bring in multiple offers and you may actually get a higher than asking price for your home.

So, if you are serious about selling your home, use some of the tips mentioned here and pay particular attention to pricing. And if you really do want to sell your home in 24 hours, be very aggressive with your price.

Craig Jones has been a small business owner since 1991 and a Realtor since early 2005. Check out his newest web site called http://www.The-Best-Websites-Guide.com.

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