When devising up the real estate listing you want it to be amazing but you also wanted to be honest. That description along with the photos could make or break a sale so that description has to be amazing. However, there are some trigger words that you’ll want to steer clear of. Being in the real estate for several years I often have homeowners that want to rewrite the description themselves but we have to be careful about equal housing laws, discrimination and trigger words that could mean something different than the homeowner thinks. Here are five things never to put in the real estate listing description.
#1. Motivated seller.
It’s okay to be a motivated seller let’s just not divulge that right off the bat. When buyers to see motivated seller they naturally assume you’re going to take less than your asking price. And you might, let’s just not start out that way. If you are a motivated seller, don’t overprice the home but describe it to the best of your ability. If you don’t tell buyers that you are a motivated seller right off the bat, you could gain thousands of dollars more in a profit.
#2. Include the appliances being sold with the house.
A lot of sellers don’t want to move their appliances but if you say that they go with the house they may be subject to inspection. Leave them out of the final listing and if the buyers want them and you are willing to let them go, you can do so without a guarantee.
#3. You won’t accept contingent offers.
Of course, it doesn’t sound great to have to wait for someone else to sell their house before they can buy yours, but don’t disregard this type of offer immediately. Consider all the other terms that the buyer might be offering. Perhaps they’re offering higher than list price or great terms besides the contingency. If the home is been on the market a while this is definitely an offer you’ll want to consider. Remember, the home can stay active on the market and if you get a better offer in the meantime, the first buyer has between 2 to 4 days to decide whether they are going to remove the contingency or terminate the offer.
#4. Counting basements bedrooms.
A bedroom must have an exit window or way of escape and a closet and if your basement just has a couple of rooms without those other factors, you can’t count them as bedrooms. What you can do is add them in as a + to the rest of the bedrooms. Let’s say there are three functional bedrooms upstairs then you would describe it as 3+ bedrooms and explain the additional bedrooms one-on-one.
#5. Stating that your asking price is firm.
I get the most people don’t like to haggle so a lot are publishing their bottom line price, and while that can work in a great housing market, at some point you may need to negotiate your asking price. By saying that right off the bat you made to tour a buyer that will eventually come to an agreeable price with you but if they see asking price firm to begin with, it might turn them off completely and you may lose some potential buyers.
There are a lot of other things that we need to be careful with in a real estate description but these are some of the most common ones that I know sellers want to include but just are not good strategies. I want to work with you to come up with the listing description that works for both you, legalities, and buyers.
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