Selling our house

[Eritex Inc.]

My wife and I have had our house for sale now since July with no offers. We have had 25 to 30 showings, 1 sucky open house, 1 alright open house, and 1 open house that was standing room only. We have done about everything to make the house as showing friendly as possible but thought some fresh eyes might help us see what we are missing. Here are some pictures my wife took on Friday...

Living room...

Entry and stairs to second floor...

Kitchen dinette...

Laundry...

 

[CPE MT]

It's likely price, not actually anything that's wrong with the house.

 

[davway]

Would have thought the obvious answer would be that your asking too much for it.

 

[Darksiede]

Well, between price and location possibly? What is the time to the nearest school & shopping..

Here in Kansas a house won't sell unless it's way under-priced, or has excellent access to Wal-mart & a school. I've seen houses on the market for 2+ years around here, and many excellent values to be had. In my line of work, I cover the entire NE 1/4 of the state, and outside of 2 towns, houses simply aren't selling.

Manhattan has K-State and Ft. Riley next-door so it's market is in perpetual boom. Lawrence has K-U, and is near enough to K.C. that it's in boom.. People tend to love that expensive down home tree-hugging feeling Lawrence radiates for some reason :roll:

~Kev

 

[slobin3d]

the house is very clean.... too clean it doesn't look homey to me. When we sold our house in MO the Realtor suggested we leave family photos and personal items out so the house still had the feeling of a home, to make it more inviting. I don't know if she was right but the house sold.

 

[Eritex Inc.]

Master...

Master bath...

Powder room off kitchen..

Formal Dining room that we use as a home office...

Second stories 2 bedrooms and full bath...

From the street and the back yard...

...

 

[kikcaffine]

Move the chair in the living room blocking the window firstly, pull the blinds open all the dark furniture in the bedrooms makes it look really dark in there. get that black fan out of the room in the second story bedrooms, set up the office in one of those bedrooms and put a dining room table in the formal dining room.

 

[Duuuuuuuude]

Duh. The guard cat is in the way. :roll:

I too would blame the market...its just a really crummy time to sell. The people across the street from us are trying to sell their nice home in a quiet neighborhood for a very reasonable price, and its just not going. They've had an open house every weekend for three months and have gotten zilch.

 

[Eritex Inc.]

Price - This house was built 4.5 years ago and would have sold to the general public for $228,000.00 or so. It is listed under $195,000.000.

Location - Within 10 minutes of 3 of the largest/nicest shopping venues in eastern Nebraska/western Iowa. The nicest is within 5 minutes.

5 minutes from a Walmart, Target, 2 movie theaters, 3 grocery stores, and 30+ restaurants.

5 minutes from the main Expressway that takes anywhere in the metro area. 25 minutes from downtown.

Schools - In the neighborhood within walking distance.

As far as the house being to clean, I have OCD and HATE clutter plus, every agent around here says to take down all personal stuff. People have a hard time seeing themselves living there if all they see is your aunt Mable on the mantle, lol.

One more thing, it does have a 4 car garage with heat and enough power to run about any kind of shop you would like including 220.

 

[Eritex Inc.]

Move the chair in the living room blocking the window firstly, pull the blinds open all the dark furniture in the bedrooms makes it look really dark in there. get that black fan out of the room in the second story bedrooms, set up the office in one of those bedrooms and put a dining room table in the formal dining room.

The camera makes the master look dark, it is quite bright in there. Also, we had the office in that room and changed it because we heard it looks like a 2000 square foot, 2 bedroom house with it up there. The fan it in my son's room only when it is not being shown. When we have a showing, it goes to the basement.

Keep going please, honest responses is something you don't get from people that are looking. They seem afraid to offend us.

 

[kikcaffine]

I dont like the couches in the living room. Replace with leather.

 

[jason]

It all boils down to price. You bring the price down low enough someone will buy it.

You said it's 4.5 years old, think about it, the market has done nothing but tank for the last 4.5 years. Hell I bought my house 10 years ago and it's now barely worth what I paid for it.

Bottom line this ecomony SUCKS to sell a house in.

 

[Eritex Inc.]

It all boils down to price. You bring the price down low enough someone will buy it.

You said it's 4.5 years old, think about it, the market has done nothing but tank for the last 4.5 years. Hell I bought my house 10 years ago and it's now barely worth what I paid for it.

Bottom line this ecomony SUCKS to sell a house in.

Ya, I understand but the asking price is 18% lower then what it would have sold for back then. By the time we get an offer and go back and forth negotiating, it will be more then 20 to 25% under what it was worth 4 years ago. That is right on track with real estate around here.

I guess we were spoiled on our last house, we had a contract in 72 hours and closed within 20 days.

 

[Eritex Inc.]

Please do not think I am arguing with you guys and gals. I do like hearing about what others see so it can get me moving in a direction that gets this thing sold"thumbsup"

 

[jason]

What are other houses in your area going for? How long are they staying on the market?

 

[Eritex Inc.]

What are other houses in your area going for? How long are they staying on the market?

Other houses in our neighborhood are going for between $80.00 and $100.00 per finished square foot. Those same homes have 200 to 500 square foot unfinished (we have almost 1500), a 2 car garage (we have a 4 car), and was built 10 years before ours. We are at about $94.00 a square foot.

Average on the market time is 80 to 100 days before getting a contract. We are just short of 90.

 

[Cookie Monster Joe]

Hey Ger, have the wife bake some cookies for the next showing, it gives the house a homey smell and feel. You also might try rearanging the living area to make it more open on the way in, do not box it off with the couches, lose the tv as the focal point, it may be that to you but not everyone else, make the fire place the focal point. Add some seasonal color to the kitchen and living areas, might also do this to the bath areas, it does kind of have a steril feel, no offense. Also who is your agent?

Ya might sweet'n the deal with some awesome rc crawlers for the new owner and their family, just and idea. Good luck.

 

[TEAM DEBEAD]

If you can trasnport that house to Southern California, for that price, it would be gone in a split second. I want it, looks like a great house, wish I could find something like that here. Oh well back to looking at houses half that size, with half the yard, for $300,000

 

[2JSC]

Good luck with the sale G. I don't have any advice. Although house sales here in Az are close to the same. My sister was lucky enough to pick up a repo house for a cool $80k that's just under 1300sqft. At 22 I'm extremely happy for her.

 

[bmuzz1]

The curb appeal isn't bad but a bit too sparse for most peoples liking I think. I would have liked to see a tree or two in the front of the house, maybe one in the center of the yard blocking the down spout on the rain gutter and another to the left of the house. Also I would trim the hedge in front so it is not taller then the railing, it seems to be blocking the view from and to the front window.

The back yard is very nice but also a bit sparse.

The red curtains in the boys room are way too loud for resale in my opinion. You may want to use a beige tone similar to the one also in the comforter.

I agree, move the TV out of the living room and move some furniture around a bit in the same room and make the fireplace the focal point.

Baking cookies and having them out before an open house is a great idea and really makes people feel at home and is more inviting.

The realtor is right about the family photos, but the walls look a bit too bare to me especially over the bed in the master. You want people to imagine it's their home not a model.

One more thing that I notice is that your powder bath doesn't match the rest of the house, it's a bit too contemporary, although nice. I know there's not much you can do about that unless you don't mind spending a couple hundred bucks on a new faucet and cabinet hardware that ties into the rest of the house a bit better. Just an idea but maybe something in black or oil rubbed bronze in a style more like the kitchen faucet and then throw some hardware on the cabinet to match instead of the stainless.

Hope some of this helps, but as others have said, this is a really tough time to sell a home so if you have some flexibility on the price it wouldn't hurt to examine that option as well.

Good luck!