Articles
Are Listing Agents Adding to the Slow Market?
by Bill Jardine Jan 02, 2008
Riding the Hawaii real estate market can be a lot like surfing. You don’t get to control the waves, but you sure can control how you are going to deal with them!
Living in Waimea, we have an opportunity to see success and failure up close. There are those who have made great rides out of big waves as well as those who have been capsized by mere ripples. The difference between the two often seems to be their outlook on things. Those of us in the real estate agency business have been watching prices slowly fall as the natural real estate cycle recovers from the last big demand wave. Some are now crying that the market is bad, while others are calmly adjusting to reality.
The truth is that Sellers are asking too much money for their properties right now. It is really just as simple as that. When demand is high, prices rise. When demand slacks, prices fall.
Simple, simple, simple.
The problem is that there are real estate agencies willing to list properties at unrealistic prices. Think about it for a moment … If Sellers dropped prices by, say, 25%, don’t you think lots of those properties would sell? Pick any percentage you like, but the message is the same:
If Sellers adjusted prices to current demand, all properties would sell.
In the same token, if there were no real estate agencies that were willing to list properties at unrealistic prices, there wouldn’t be any over-priced listings.
There are lots of Realtors who made their reputations when selling property was easy and all they had to say to their clients was “Sure, we can try that.” They are still hoping that their lack of skill will work the way it did when rising demand would erase their short-comings.
The way to tell the difference between a good agency and a lousy one today is to offer them an over-priced listing. If they politely say “no” you are in good hands. If they say “Well, we can try that.”, you are probably dealing with someone perpetuating the problem rather than solving it.
Meantime … if you want to get a property at a great price this is the time to do it. We can help you make offers that address the real value of the property rather than the poofy dreams left over from yesterday’s fevered Sellers’ market. Were just a simple “click” away. Try it out.
Imua!
Bill Jardine
