Pricing a listing is one of the hardest— and perhaps most important — tasks in residential real estate.
Sellers can get it wrong in either direction: If the asking price is too low, the sellers might end up leaving money on the table; if it’s too high, they won’t tap into the right target group, will lose a lot of time and may then end up selling for even less.
Contact the appraisers at www.scappraisals.com for your listing price questions.
Sometimes, the seller and the agent might not agree on a price. And even if they do, the sellers might look for some “objective” method to corroborate their number. That’s why our listing clients frequently ask us if it’s a good idea to get an appraisal before they put the house on the market. But should you?
Well, it depends on your reasons.
Chris Connors is a Bethesda-based independent appraiser whom I met years ago when he was working with a large credit union, and he often gets hired by potential sellers. Usually, the owners come to him because they have talked to several different agents and got very different suggestions for a price from them, he said.
Just a couple of days ago, Connors said he finished an appraisal on a house where the seller had previously interviewed two realty agents. The first one suggested an asking price around $800,000, the second one was closer to $1.1 million.
“The seller was quite angry with me,” Connors said, “when my report supported the first estimate, and I told him the other guy just wanted to get the listing.”
In cases like that, just like in limited-service or for-sale-by-owner situations, a full professional appraisal might be an important reality check. The same might be true for buyers who are not represented by an agent and need to make sure they won’t overpay.
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Green Real Estate Appraiser 