WHAT IS MY HOUSE WORTH?

That’s a good question. And one I get asked a lot these days. People are curious and always wanting to know how their largest personal investment is doing. I wish there was an easy answer to this but such is not always the case. When the pandemic hit, many newer agents would simply ask their seller client what they wanted for their home and Voila! There was the price. Often times that would work because the buying frenzy was full steam ahead and people were paying what was asked and in many cases much more than that. Bidding wars were the flavour of the day so when the dust settled the seller wound up with way more than originally expected. That was an unrealistic and unsustainable market as we have seen in hindsight. Many of those purchases were made when interest rates were at a record low and now that they are renegotiating their rather large mortgages, the buyers are finding out just how much they overpaid. It would seem we are getting back to a more reasonable marketplace. The agents now have to earn their keep. And by that I mean when someone asks what their home is worth, they have to dig in and do some actual homework. One of the largest hurdles that has to be cleared is making the seller acutely aware of the current market trends. It no longer matters what the neighbour down the street got for their home in 2020. Prior to 2016 if you wanted to price a home you would look up comparable recent sales. And these would have to be homes that were similar. You can’t compare a bungalow to a two-storey for obvious reasons. One car or two car garage? Size of yard? Amenities? Proximity to schools, shopping and transit? Recent upgrades? Pool or no pool? Assessed value? Well, you get the drift. When the madness hit in 2019 most of these matters became superfluous. People were just buying plain and simple. But now they DO matter. So when someone asks what’s it worth, the agent had better be able to explain these differences. Many times the seller will say “This is what I want” and more likely than not, it’s an unreasonable number. Hey, I think my place is worth a million bucks too, but would I get that in today’s market? Not a chance. We have seen the average price drop in the Scugog area in the last year or so. There was one place that tried to get 1.2 mill and it was up for quite a while. Then dropped price to 1.1 mill. Still no takers. Cancelled listing and came back a few months later at 999. Still no takers. When the light finally went on and it listed at 799 it sold in a matter of weeks. So when I have someone tell me this is what I want and I won’t take a penny less for an unreasonable amount, I usually say well good luck with that and hope you find an agent that will make that happen for you because it won’t be me. Now, more than ever before, people are not rushing into rash decisions, so if you do decide to sell, make sure you get the feel of the current market and list accordingly, otherwise you’ll be sitting with a For Sale sign on your lawn for a long time. Feel free to check out this story and more on my blog site at: https://slackie14.wixsite.com/buy-sell-and-more