Question:
“When we put our home on the market, how long should we wait before dropping the price if it’s not selling?”
Answer:
Smart question. Too many people get stubbornly attached to their asking price and ignore the reality of feedback from the market.
To answer your question, let’s assume three things:
- Your home is on the Realtor’s MLS so it gets full exposure.
- Your home is generally similar to others in the area. A truly unique home (e.g. a 3,000 square foot custom home in a neighborhood of 1,000 square feet tract homes) will take longer to sell.
- Your home is under $1,500,000. This is an arbitrary cutoff, but the key is that more expensive homes take longer to sell on average.
That being said…
The answer then depends on the market.
In the hyper-crazy seller’s market we had from January 2012 through May 2013, I could tell in as little as 48 hours(!) if a home was priced right. Though I’d usually wait a week to suggest a price change.
In our still strong seller’s market, I wait about 2 weeks to suggest a reduction.
In a “normal” market, where we have an equilibrium of buyers and sellers, a price change is called for if the home is unsold in 3-4 weeks.
And in a slow market, around 6 weeks.
In summary, here’s how long to wait to adjust your price if your home isn’t selling…
- Very strong market: 1 week
- Strong market: 2 weeks
- Normal market: 4 weeks
- Slow market: 6 weeks
Last comment. There may be other options instead of reducing the price. The most common would be improving the home so the value goes up.
