FAMILY & HOME
SELLING YOUR
LUXURY HOME
It takes knowledge, strategy and finesse
By Tracy Ellis
Selling a million dollar-home in an expensive development or on acreage
of its own is not the same as selling a fixer upper or a median or averagepriced home.
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It takes a totally different strategy.
In real estate, as in life, it’s always best to make a great first impression.
Marketing and pricing of your home (in any price range) is critical from
the start. If your house sits on the market for more than a few months, it
begins to develop a reputation….and not a good one.
When buyers and their agents find a listing that’s been on the market
for a long time, they usually throw out lowball offers. And I can’t blame
them. It’s a fair assumption that if another buyer hasn’t been willing to
buy it at the current price, why should they? This creates a vicious cycle.
It’s even worse for sellers of luxury listings, because instead of resorting
to a price cut of $5,000 or $10,000, they often need to trim the listing
GAZELLE STL
price by $50,000 or even $100,000. The higher the original price, the
greater the reduction needs to be to stay competitive.
Affluent buyers buy for completely different reasons than typical
homebuyers.
The higher you move up the home price ladder, the more important
intangibles become. In other words, luxury homes are more about art
than science. On a typical $100,000 home, the numbers drive the entire
process. The buyer closely monitors the potential monthly mortgage
amount, the utilities, the interest rate and closing costs. They are very
much concerned with the “science” of the deal. They are restricted by
the numbers….their budget is the main driver of the process. This is not
true of luxury buyers.
Of course, affluent homebuyers still pay attention to the numbers. They
won’t allow themselves to get “ripped off.” But instead of being limited
by a strict budget, affluent buyers generally make their buying decisions