The Hardball Approach to Negotiating on Your Home’s Final Selling Price

Every home seller aims for profit when they sell their prized real estate property. On the other hand, homebuyers are always looking for the best deal for their purchase. These conflicting interests can keep a pending home sale in a stalemate, or worse, cause a potential deal to fall through in the end. This is where a sound negotiation strategy will come in handy. Follow these tips if you’re looking to take a firm and unrelenting position toward maximizing the returns on your home sale.

Price your property correctly

Make sure that you’re in a strong position to stay firm with your asking price by getting it right from the very beginning. Get help from your real estate agent to get a comparative market analysis done to see how much your home is worth given current market conditions.

Have your house inspected before selling

Another important pre-selling step that will strengthen your stance at the negotiation is making sure that every part of the house is in good condition. Get your property inspected to identify any issues that need repairing or updating so that buyers will be hard-pressed to find anything to justify a significant price reduction.

Encourage competition 

Starting a bidding war among several buyers is the ideal scenario for any home seller. To do this, maximize the visibility of your listing by using a variety of platforms, such as traditional print ads as well as contemporary online channels like online listing pages and social media. In addition, plan an open house (although consider holding a virtual one to limit close quarters interaction among people). This will give you an opportunity to demonstrate that multiple buyers are interested in your property, making them put up a competitive stance if they are seriously interested in buying it. Wait until after the open house before entertaining any offers. If you manage to stir up a bidding war, remember to keep communication lines open with all interested parties. While some buyers will back away when the bidding goes beyond their reach, serious buyers will likely keep driving your final sale price higher.

Counteroffer using your list price

Once offers start coming in, be firm with your asking price and keep it your first counteroffer every time you respond to an interested buyer—even if they give you a lowball offer. There’s always the risk of turning away some potential buyers, but you can still trust that seriously interested buyers will stick around to keep negotiating.

Set a tight deadline for buyers to respond to your counteroffer

When you make a counteroffer to an interested buyer, you can’t entertain other offers. Give the buyer timeline just one or two days to accept or reject your counteroffer so that in case they reject it, you don’t lose too much time entertaining other interested buyers.

Reject an offer outright

This strategy requires a sound understanding of your local market and the value of your property. Instead of countering, reject the offer and ask for a new, better offer. While this can turn off some buyers, it also suggests that you are confident about what your property is worth. By not making a counteroffer, you also keep yourself open to entertaining and accepting other offers that may come along.

Sweeten the pot

Taking on a few concessions in the deal is a great way to maintain a firm stance on your asking price while reassuring the buyer that they can get great value from their purchase. It’s a win-win situation. A buyer may be more willing to agree to your asking price if you can offer to:

• Cover repair costs offer a home warranty
• Pay the closing costs
• Include furniture or appliances (if you don’t want buyers taking interest in these pieces, remove them from your home before hosting any viewings)
• Move out sooner, according to the buyer’s schedule

In fact, if you decide that you can afford to throw in these bonuses, you can incorporate these costs right at the beginning and establish a higher ask before you list your home.

Work with a seasoned listing agent

A local agent will help you simplify every stage of the home selling process—from evaluating your pre-selling steps, to handling the final negotiations with the buyer after a purchase agreement is reached. Your agent will represent your best interests at the negotiating table in a courteous and professional manner, no matter how tense the negotiations can get. Get the best offers and sell your Metro Atlanta house fast when you use the Page Morgan Real Estate Group as your listing agent. Call 770.579.5650 or 770.509.0700, or email info(at)pagemorgan(dotted)com to learn more about how we can help you achieve your home selling goals.