Here are 10 tips to sell in any season:
Pick your agent
Ask three agents from your area to offer their strategy on how they would sell your house. Do they suggest an auction or private treaty sale? Why? And ask them to provide evidence (recent sales of similar houses in surrounding streets) for the price they suggest it will sell for.
You want an experienced agent who knows your market and can hook the right buyer. One way to get to know agents is to attend open houses as a would-be buyer. You can assess the agents' selling styles, marketing materials and get a feel for how good they are at returning phone calls, a critical factor in a selling campaign.
Be realistic with price
Don't assume you can pay for your renovations or achieve what you may have achieved at the market's peak in 2007 - in some areas, prices are still lower than they were at that time, despite recent rises.
"A lot of vendors remember what their homes were worth three years ago," says an agent from LJ Hooker Avalon, David Watson. "If they're downsizing or trying to utilise a lot of the capital value out of their existing residences, they remember, 'Gosh, my house used to be worth $5 million and now you're telling me high threes [million dollars]? I'll wait until it's up in the fives again."'
For an independent viewpoint, vendors can also check sales in their local area by paying for a report from the Fairfax-owned Australian Property Monitors.
Early spring clean
Houses should be thoroughly cleaned and de-cluttered. Anything that detracts from a potential sale needs to be thrown out, put in storage or sold at the local auction rooms, market, garage sale or on eBay. "Most houses are over-furnished," says an agent from Richardson & Wrench Castlecrag, Mark O'Brien.
The trick is to make the property look comfortable without having too many personal things. You could even put your own furniture in storage and hire designer gear. Seek your agent's advice on whether a stylist is needed.
Create street appeal
It's important to have the property looking smart from the outside because that's what many buyers fall in love with.
Chauncy recommends vendors consider a house wash with a high-pressure hose. The service costs about $500 and gets rid of cobwebs and dust and can freshen pavers.
Bring in the repairmen
You'll want to eliminate any evidence of damp and moisture, doors and windows that stick and cracked glass, Chauncy says. "Spending that little bit of extra money by getting those things right enhances the emotional appeal," he says.
While it's hard to put a figure on exactly how much more a property can achieve if it is well presented, Chauncy says buyers could expect an extra 5 per cent or 10 per cent.
Check the outside lights are working, because you'll want to keep them turned on at night for house-hunters driving by.
Carpets should be steam-cleaned a few days before your first viewing to allow time for any cleaning smells to evaporate. Window cleaning can also help create a "lasting impression", Chauncy says.
Building and pest inspections
As a vendor, you're not required to have building and pest inspections done - yet. Although the state government is considering making them mandatory. An agent with Belle Property Annandale, Namir Mikha, says some vendors are commissioning their own reports anyway and are finding they help their property sell quicker. "Buyers can see the vendor [is] not really hiding anything," Mikha says.
Getting building and pest inspections done can also help sellers identify problems with the house, avoiding "having a bit of a heart attack when the report comes in from a buyer", Mikha says.
Picture perfect
When it comes to marketing, photographs can be the most important element. "Many buyers will judge your property within five to 10 seconds of looking at the photos and if they're not excited ... then they simply won't read on and they'll go on to the next house," Chauncy says.
The principal of Belle Property Wahroonga, Ian Clarke, agrees: "So many agents have got pixellated photographs ... or even photographs of toilets, which is just a joke."
One trap can be to show buyers photographs of everything in the property. O'Brien says you're better having five or six powerful shots. "Nobody wants to see the third bedroom or the fourth bathroom," he says. And avoid shots of cleaning equipment in the swimming pool.
Exit pets
Pet smells can be a major turn-off for buyers. "Not everyone is a dog or a cat person. You just don't need it," O'Brien says.
During the sales campaign, you might want to pay for your four-legged friend to have a holiday at the kennels. You might get the money back with a higher sale price.
If they've been living indoors, getting rid of their lingering scent will generally mean a top-to-bottom polish, plus professionally cleaning any carpets and soft furnishings.
Entice the buyers
When you find a buyer who is offering the right price, you'll want to be able to progress the sale as quickly as possible. Some buyers may want shorter or longer settlements and it's worth thinking in advance about whether you would be prepared to agree to that and letting your agent know. This can save time and can sometimes help the agent seal a deal quickly.
Mikha says negotiations are sometimes slowed by buyers requesting changes to the contract to better reflect the inclusions of the house. Providing a thorough list of inclusions to your solicitor or conveyancer from the outset can alleviate that problem, he says.
Open-day know-how
Fresh flowers can appeal on open days but O'Brien warns vendors not to go over the top. A big no-no is playing music.
"People just think you're drowning out noise," O'Brien says. "You're better off not having mood music and all that sort of thing; you're not in an elevator, you're in someone's house."
O'Brien is also against automatically turning every light on. "If a certain light needs to be on, well that's fine," he says. But if you "turn all the lights on ... it alerts people that it might be a dark house when it may not be".
If your house is on a busy road, it could be best to leave the doors open, even if you're on a secondary road and there is some traffic noise. Closing the door is "all too obvious, you've got to give people more credit than that", O'Brien says.
Switch brings a change of fortune
Jennie Holley was under pressure to reduce the asking price of the North Curl Curl house she was selling with her sister, Claire White, earlier this year.
The campaign had failed to create interest and, as auction day neared, fewer house-hunters were looking through the five-bedroom property.
"He didn't really advertise," Holley says of her agent. "[They had] just a few little articles in the paper but it didn't get any real response."
The situation became so bad Holley cancelled the auction and sacked the agent. White and her husband, Marc, were moving back to Britain, so there was a need to sell quickly.
The sisters immediately relisted the property with a new agent, Peter Pagliaro of McGrath. The difference was astounding.
After minor tweaks, such as changing the colours of the cushions on the lounges and taking new photos, he booked a solid advertising campaign.
"He had appointments through the week, he just put a whole lot of effort into selling it," Holley says.
The house sold before auction for $1.25 million, $150,000 more than the families had expected with their first agent.
Second time around: What to do if your first attempt fails
If your property is passed in at auction, there is a fair chance you may need to lower your price expectations, says BresicWhitney director Shannan Whitney.
Whitney warns vendors against making hasty changes to houses without evidence there is an issue.
NG Farah agent Ken Smith says many properties sell within two weeks of auction but price adjustment is often needed. If feedback suggests the price is right, you might need to be patient as a post-auction campaign takes effect.
Sometimes it can also be worth giving the property a rest, as solicitor Rosemary Amos found out. When Amos put her four-bedroom house in Kintore Street, Wahroonga to auction last October it failed to sell, achieving a bid $80,000 below expectations. It languished on the market for another month so Rosemary and husband Phil, a sales manager, rested it.
They launched a fresh private-treaty campaign with a new agent, Belle Property's Ian Clarke, in April and it sold four weeks later for their desired price of $1.8 million. The Amoses hadn't changed the house and used photos from the first try.
Rosemary says Clarke, a newer agent to the area, seemed "hungrier". She also believes the time of year and selling by private treaty instead of auction may have helped secure the sale.
Read More: http://news.domain.com.au/domain/real-estate-news
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