Today I wanted to talk about how many showings are a good amount for your home. In the end, it really comes down to your price point. The reason why is because it depends what the inventory looks like in the price point that you are currently selling your house in, and from there how many showings are acceptable or not.
There are three types of real estate markets:
Buyers market
Sellers market
Balanced market
Depending on the price of your home you could be in any of these three markets.
Luxury is often in a buyers market, meaning that they have more sellers in the market and fewer buyers. What has happened to the luxury market recently is that jumbo loans are no longer being funded by many lenders. With that being said, getting a loan for anything over 600,000 in Salt Lake County, and over 510,000 in Utah County is a whole lot harder than it has been in the past. This means there are not as many buyers in the market, but that there are still sellers looking to sell their home. In the luxury market at least one showing a month is sufficient, because it is going to take months and months to sell a house at such a high price point regardless. If you happen to be in this price point, it might be a good idea to get your house on the market, so you get the exposure going now instead of waiting. It also may be a good idea not to. It depends on your house specifically, your price point, and what is going on in your neighborhood. You can always reach out to me and I can go over the numbers with you.
A balanced market means that there are the same amount of buyers as there are sellers, creating a balance, also meaning that neither buyer or seller has control. On average it takes 6 months to sell a home in a balanced market. That doesn’t mean that every house takes six months, it just means that if nothing else listed from today forward, it would take 6 months to sell. So houses that look like a good deal or that are marketed properly are selling for more money. Who you hire makes a big difference when you are selling in a balanced market. The ideal amount of showings for a balanced market is one every other week. If you have at least one showing every other week, you’re still staying fresh with the buyers, but if you go a full two weeks without showings that is a problem.
The last market is a sellers market, and we are in a sellers market in most of Utah County and Salt Lake, but not all of Utah County and Salt Lake because there are some pocket areas that are in a balanced market. In a sellers market you want at least 2-3 showings a week to keep you on track. On opening weekend you should always have more showings, because you are the “new shiny object” on the market. When you are that “new shiny object” that is when you should have a goal to get an offer, because that is how you are going to sell for the most amount of money. It requires a lot of pre-marketing to get your house ready for pictures, marketed properly, and getting it exposed to anyone and everyone possible. If you don’t have an offer in a sellers market by your 10th showing, there is something wrong with the price, or something wrong with the house that needs to be changed.
There are only really 3 things that affect how you sell a house: The price, the condition, and the location. So if you can’t change the location, the only two things we can do as real estate professionals and home owners is changing the price or the condition. What do I mean by changing the condition? This could mean painting, carpeting, doing the things that a lot of buyers want and perceive are super expensive, or dropping the price to make you look like a good deal. This is an ongoing process that you have to watch what your neighbors and houses surrounding you are doing. It’s not a competition between you and the other contracts sold, but a competition between you and the other active homes on the market today on who is going to go under contract first.
In the end, it really depends on your house and your price point. If you are thinking about selling, please reach out to me and we can go over all of these numbers in detail specific to you and your house.
