• Why Hire a Real Estate Agent or Realtor? – Ok, we’re biased, but getting help from someone with intimate knowledge of the market is the smartest thing you can do.
• Does Buying a Rental as an Investment Make Sense? – For those of you thinking big, this may be a good time to get a deal on a rental investment.
• To Sell an Apartment, No Detail Is Too Small – You might need to dial down some of the numbers from this article in the New York Times, but it’s spot on. Paying attention to how your home shows goes a long way to selling at a better price.

Analyze your market first. Determine how many houses similar to yours are up for sale. Consider neighborhood, school district, size and price point. The more homes there are, the more it becomes necessary to list at the lower end of the prevailing price range.

[A] professional home inspector will be able to point out issues that might go unnoticed by someone who doesn’t know the ins and outs of inspecting. Today’s buyers are quick to point out flaws uncovered by the home inspectors they bring with them, particularly if the flaws could compromise health or safety. Buyers can use problems as bargaining chips, causing previously agreed upon prices to be lowered or even the cancellation of a deal. Inspections help uncover imperfections that often can be fixed easily and inexpensively, so it’s worth it to get your home inspected before you list it.

In Chicago at least, standard practice is for the buyer to hire an inspector once they have already signed a contract to buy a home. At that point though, an inspection can turn up issues that sellers may not have known about, and could have fixed for much less money and fewer headaches. It may be worth it to hire an inspector and resolve any issues before you even list your home.

The Tribune’s Mary Umberger offers a list of gotchas that can prevent you from selling your home, or when you do, getting the highest price possible. Beyond making sure the home is in good shape and free of clutter, sellers often don’t think about other factors, like their reaction to offers and personalization of the home, that can impact a successful sale.

The hardest part about a declining or stagnant market is deciding where to set your asking price. In an “up” market, this was easy: you could look at recent sales of similar homes and set your price a little higher. But when things are moving in the opposite direction, how do you know where to start?

In the book Shift: How Top Real Estate Agents Tackle Tough Times, author Gary Keller says the same logic applies. Sellers in a down market have to get ahead of declining values and set their asking prices where they will attract offers, and this often means lower than recent comparable sales. As Bob Hunt says in his review of the book for Realty Times, “If you fail to get ahead of the market when the market is in decline, the consequence is not that you simply receive a lower price; the consequence is that you don’t get a sale at all.”

Homescape’s Duane Hopper offers up a real estate version of the perennial list of resolutions, this time for home sellers in a tough market. All ten are good ideas, but our two favorites are:

• Create the “wow” factor – Staging, staging, staging. You may think you have impeccable style, but potential buyers need to walk in a home and picture themselves living there, not you. That means sprucing things up, neutralizing personal touches, and making the very best use of space, and …
• Know your competition – Which translates to, “Set a realistic asking price.” You have to acknowledge the other properties for sale in your neighborhood and price tier. A home is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it, and if you can’t justify a higher price relative to the competition, you’ll sit on the market.

Are homeowners still in denial about falling home values, or have they learned to be realistic? It depends who you ask, naturally. Mary Umberger tells us that Zillow.com thinks homeowners are in denial, not surprising for a company whose business model is based on the presumption that it knows how much your home is worth better than you. On the other side, a study by Reuters and the University of Michigan finds that just less than half of homeowners–twice as many as last year–think that their home has declined in value.

We’ve found that the degree to which sellers are flexible about asking prices depends on their urgency. Those who are just testing the waters, or haven’t even started shopping for a new home yet, are more willing to stick to their dream price. Those whose home has been on the market for a long time, have already purchased a new home contingent upon the sale of their current one, or need to relocate, are more flexible.

We hate to use the term “realistic” about describing how someone determines an asking price, because that implies that holding out for a certain price is always bad, even if time and urgency allow. Some sellers can afford the risk of longer market times in turn for getting a higher asking price. But others need to sell within a certain time period, and those people need to be the most flexible and willing to adjust their expectations according to their circumstances.

This week’s Tribune has a useful article about how longstanding “rules” of real estate still apply, even in today’s changing market. Buyers and sellers can count on certain maxims to get the best deal, regardless of the financial environment, including:

• You should always shop around for mortgages
• The right initial price is the key to selling
• Negotiate every offer