You’ve listed your house for sale with a Lake Gaston real estate firm. Now what?
First, agree with your agent’s request that he be allowed to put a lockbox on your home. Buyers at Lake Gaston are usually here only for the day, and if the showing agent has to go out of his way to pick up a key or coordinate with the seller being there, he may simply show another home instead.
Then, and I know this is hard, but agree that when an agent calls to ask if he can show your home, the listing company can say “That’ll be fine, go right on.” The listing company will then call your home and tell you, or leave a message on your answering machine, “Lake Country Realty will be showing your house in about 20 minutes”.
You’ll get far more showing with this procedure than with “Have them wait until 3:00pm to show my house.” Lake Gaston has 350 miles of shoreline and at 3:00pm the showing agent may be on the far side of the Lake or even worse, the buyers may have said, “Now we have to leave at 2:30pm”.
Since agents can show your home anytime between 9:00am and 5:00pm, whenever you leave home during those hours, you should leave it ready to be shown. In addition to being tidy, have all the curtains open, the air conditioning/heat at the normal temperature, and the water left on in case the buyers need to use the bathroom.
Also leave the sign-in register on the kitchen counter where it can be easily seen so the showing agent can sign-in and get extra spec sheets if he needs them. And please, once you list your house for sale, no smoking in it. To the non-smoker, a smoked in house seems dirty.
Now you’re at home and you’ve gotten a call that an agent and buyer will be there in 20 minutes. Of course you’ll open all the curtains and start tidying up. But when the doorbell rings, answer it, welcome them, say “take all the time you like”, and go for a drive or a long walk. It’s very hard for an agent and buyer to have the kind of conversation they need to have if you’re in the house. “I couldn’t live with this master bedroom carpeting.” “Yes, it looks like something I’d pick out without my wife. Good carpeting runs about $3.00 a square foot installed, so you could replace it for about $700.”
We agents at Lake Gaston normally don’t call the listing agent after each showing, so don’t be too hard on your agent if you don’t get much feedback. I think the best agreement is to ask your agent to call you on the first of every month and give you an overview. Does he still feel the price is right, does the market seem to be improving or declining, is buying traffic in general good, bad or average; in summary, is there anything we should change?
If not, simply keep doing the same thing and try to be patient. Now, on to "Our House hasn't Sold!"
First, agree with your agent’s request that he be allowed to put a lockbox on your home. Buyers at Lake Gaston are usually here only for the day, and if the showing agent has to go out of his way to pick up a key or coordinate with the seller being there, he may simply show another home instead.
Then, and I know this is hard, but agree that when an agent calls to ask if he can show your home, the listing company can say “That’ll be fine, go right on.” The listing company will then call your home and tell you, or leave a message on your answering machine, “Lake Country Realty will be showing your house in about 20 minutes”.
You’ll get far more showing with this procedure than with “Have them wait until 3:00pm to show my house.” Lake Gaston has 350 miles of shoreline and at 3:00pm the showing agent may be on the far side of the Lake or even worse, the buyers may have said, “Now we have to leave at 2:30pm”.
Since agents can show your home anytime between 9:00am and 5:00pm, whenever you leave home during those hours, you should leave it ready to be shown. In addition to being tidy, have all the curtains open, the air conditioning/heat at the normal temperature, and the water left on in case the buyers need to use the bathroom.
Also leave the sign-in register on the kitchen counter where it can be easily seen so the showing agent can sign-in and get extra spec sheets if he needs them. And please, once you list your house for sale, no smoking in it. To the non-smoker, a smoked in house seems dirty.
Now you’re at home and you’ve gotten a call that an agent and buyer will be there in 20 minutes. Of course you’ll open all the curtains and start tidying up. But when the doorbell rings, answer it, welcome them, say “take all the time you like”, and go for a drive or a long walk. It’s very hard for an agent and buyer to have the kind of conversation they need to have if you’re in the house. “I couldn’t live with this master bedroom carpeting.” “Yes, it looks like something I’d pick out without my wife. Good carpeting runs about $3.00 a square foot installed, so you could replace it for about $700.”
We agents at Lake Gaston normally don’t call the listing agent after each showing, so don’t be too hard on your agent if you don’t get much feedback. I think the best agreement is to ask your agent to call you on the first of every month and give you an overview. Does he still feel the price is right, does the market seem to be improving or declining, is buying traffic in general good, bad or average; in summary, is there anything we should change?
If not, simply keep doing the same thing and try to be patient. Now, on to "Our House hasn't Sold!"
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