You and/or your agent did a lot of research and you took your best guess as to where to list your home but you’ve had no showings and it’s been 3 weeks. It’s time to reduce. Any time your home sits with no showings or very few for the market, it’s time to reduce the price.

It means that the buyers looking in your price range are rejecting your home without even seeing it. Sometimes it’s because it compares poorly to other homes in that price range on paper or on the internet. Sometimes it’s because your home is “invisible” to the actual potential buyer because it’s price in a range they are not looking in.

The rule of thumb used to be to always price a home ending in a “9” price point. For example, $99,000 or $249,000. Just as in retail stores, prices ending in a “9” appear cheaper from a psychological standpoint. The internet has changed that to an extent.

The customer who wants a home that might include that home at $249,000 would miss it if they were searching for homes from $250,000 to $275,000. Had that seller been priced at $250,000 it would not only show up in the search but might very well be the least expensive home found. At $249,000 it’s missed entirely.

Now a seller must take into account that most buyers begin their search on the internet and will look in price ranges. If a price reduction won’t take the home into a new search category it’s probably useless. For example, reducing a price from $112,000 to $106,000 won’t capture new lookers, but dropping it from $106,000 to $100,000 probably will.

Even after a home is listed, a seller should think like a potential buyer and from time to time “surf the net” to see how the home stacks up an a variety of searches.

Bottom line? No showings, reduce the price. You can’t negotiate a contract till you get a buyer to write one.

That may sound rude but there is such a thing as “functional (or structural) obsolescence. That means that a home is dated in a way, compared to other homes, that cannot easily be changed.

Changing from carpet to tile floors, or repainting, can be easy changes to make and still compare favorably to other homes on the market. Updating kitchens or bathrooms can be much more expensive, but still doable. But changing the outside of the home or the roof line, is generally prohibitive in cost.

If yours is the only frame home and the other homes around you are brick, then that isn’t fixable. The only way to even the playing field is to lower the price of the frame home.

The “pitch” or angle on a roof is dictated as much by custom and style as building code. Older homes may have a different pitch than newer homes and again, the only way to compensate for a home that looks like it’s dated is by adjusting price.

The location of a home may become “obsolete” making the home less desirable if it fronts a road that is more heavily trafficked or under construction or now backs up to commercial property. Again, while it’s a difficult pill to swallow, the only answer is a price adjustment.

Then, at some point, a buyer will say, “who cares if the home has ______, it’s a great price.”

Make your home stand out from the market

The rules have changed. Everyone knows that supply far exceeds demand right now on resale homes. In a normal market, a home priced competitively would receive showings and within a reasonable time, an offer. That is not always the case these days.

Right now there are well-priced homes on the market that are not even getting showings. Buyers are still holding back and more homes get added to the inventory.

This is what can happen next:

• Let’s say a home is listed for $250,000 in January and that price puts it mid-way between competing properties. Each month new homes are listed and others on the market drop their prices. Within a matter of months, that $250,000 home owner finds himself at the top of the market among his competition.

• A better strategy would have been to list the home in January at the low end of the market, making it the best VALUE among competing homes. It is likely that it would have been the next home to sell.

• Now even if the $250,000 home drops its price it’s still the mid-priced home and other homes are a better value. So the seller has to “chase the market”. Had he “led the market” he may well have been sold.

Often Realtors are the ones who deliver the information about what the market is doing and the inclination is to “shoot the messenger”. Just as doctors sometimes have to give unpleasant test results, so do real estate agents. But sellers need and deserve the facts so that they can make informed decisions.

Pricing a home right at the very beginning can insure a faster sale and better net proceeds to the seller.