What is Real Estate

Writen by Ed Chaparro

An expired listing is a home that did not sell within the contractual term of a listing agreement. Many real estate agents set up an automated e-mail notification of expired listings on MLS. It's a potential source of business since presumably these are homeowners that wanted to sell their home but were not successful for a variety of reasons. Well, just what are these reasons? Why do listings expire? Listings can expire for all sorts of reasons. However, there are three reasons that are particularly common: (1) condition, (2) pricing and (3) marketing.

There's more to selling a home than putting a sign in front of the house and waiting for buyers to show up. Your home is competing with other homes to capture the interest of serious buyers. Make sure it shows well. Try to see your home objectively through a buyer's eyes. Start with the outside of your home, evaluating its curb appeal. Walk through every room of the home as a buyer would. If you can't be objective, retain the services of a professional real estate agent and get them involved early on.

Overpricing is a very common reason homes don't sell. Did I mention your home is competing with other homes? When a home is overpriced it just makes competing homes look better by comparison. Make sure you set a price that is grounded on facts. While it's true you're entitled to ask whatever price you desire, buyers have the final word and get to decide if they will pay it. As long as your home is on the market, your real estate agent should be soliciting feedback from everyone coming in to see the home, and relaying that feedback to you. Listen to the collective feedback. Don't ignore the market. If you do, the market will ignore you.

Marketing is a critical component to getting a home sold for top dollar. Putting a sign on the yard and listing the home on a MLS may be enough to sell a home sometimes. But, it's often not. Over 75% of buyers begin their home search on the Internet. Consequently, the marketing plan to sell your home should make the Internet an important component, along with other traditional marketing channels such as direct mail.

Did you offer a competitive commission rate? Motivating the hundreds of agents in your community to work for you is an important part of the marketing plan. If the commission split offered to buyer agents is too low your home has a much higher chance of just sitting there with little or no activity.

Was your home accessible to buyers? To sell a home a buyer has to see it, feel it and experience it. If they can't get into your home it's not going to sell. If you didn't do so before, consider using a lockbox to ensure real estate agents showing your home easy access.

If you actually received a bona fide offer from a qualified buyer, chances are your real estate agent did a reasonable job marketing your home. If you didn't get any offers, there's a good chance it was due to one or more of the above reasons.

Ed Chaparro is a licensed New Jersey real estate agent with Prudential New Jersey Properties servicing Middlesex, Union and Somerset Counties.

Ed Chaparro has over twenty years of experience working with technology and putting it to use to help people and businesses. Ed Chaparro mixes traditional real estate marketing (MLS, signs, direct mail) with a very aggressive Internet marketing plan that maximizes the number of buyers reached.

For buyers, Ed Chaparro provides methods and communications that enable them to view their options in manner that is efficient, informative and free of any hard-sell tactics. This approach has garnered Ed Chaparro a great deal of buyer loyalty.

For more details and information please visit http://www.EdChaparro.com