Pricing Your Property To Sell

Notwithstanding the fact that area real estate sales are up 65% in terms of units for the first quarter of 2010 indicating a strong demand, pricing your property to be in the market and not just on the market is key to achieving a sale.
For five consecutive years (2005 to 2009) the annual number of "expired" listings in the MLS® system of the Georgian Triangle Real Estate Board have exceeded the number of properties that have sold. That to me is a very telling number indicating that sellers and their REALTORS® are failing to price properties reflective of their current market value.
Factors that do not have a bearing on the value of your home are what you paid, what you may have spent on renovations/upgrades, what you owe, what you need to net out to purchase your next home and so on. The most fundamental factor that does serve to establish the value of your property is what have other properties similar to yours sold for?
When contemplating the sale of your home, condo or other property, it is absolutely imperative that the REALTOR(S)® you interview prepares a "Comparable Market Analysis" (CMA). I an increasingly competitive market, it's no longer effective for a REALTOR® to simply walk through a property shooting from the hip to throw out a price. Your response should be "show me!"
Not only will a well prepared CMA help to establish an accurate List Price for your home, it can also be used to illustrate and counsel a potential buyer(s) as to the property's value and what a credible offer price should be. Today's buyers are fearful of paying too much and with a good inventory of properties on the market they don't have to. Furthermore, thanks to the Internet, buyers today are much better educated and informed. They know what is on the market, how long it has been listed and they are readily able to compare various listings to one another quickly establishing a sense of which ones are over-priced.
Just as over-pricing is an issue, so is under-pricing a property. I recently secured a listing which another competing agent had priced $35K to $40K below my price, a difference of almost 20%. Their price represented little more than the "assessed" value which in many cases is still well below market value. Within three days the home in question received two offers and sold for in excess of 98% of the asking price.
Pricing is indeed everything and some good research and effort going in by the REALTOR® you are working with whether it is for a sale or purchase, will make the whole real estate selling/buying process more successful and less stressful for everyone involved.