What to price a home at when putting it up for sale used to be heavily based on data from recent sales. While still useful, the market has been impacted by short sales and foreclosures which affect sale prices and monthly market shifts play a role, too. In addition to looking at past sales, it is very important to make sure that you look at the active competition in your area. Similar houses in your area have always been your "competition", but never more so than now when buyers have more houses to choose from. Make sure your home is priced competitively, even agressively. Make it stand out. Doing so will help sell YOUR house. Overpricing your homes isn’t doing you any favors, rather it makes the lesser priced competition more attractive to buyers.
So how do you keep track of your competition? You can rely on your real estate agent to keep you informed. You can look up competing properties in your neighborhod on firstweber.com or another Wisconsin real estate website of your choosing. Another convenient way to get notifications of new listings and price changes in your community and selected price range is to set up a free MyFirstWeber account. That way, you’ll be emailed information about real estate in your area rather than have to go look. It is a helpful tool for when you are looking for a home as well. You can set up a separate search for the area and price range you are looking to buy in.
If your home isn’t on the market right now and you are wondering about recent sale prices, you can surely call in a local real estate agent for information in your area. If you are not ready for that yet, did you know that you are able to search SOLD property data on firstweber.com? In South Central Wisconsin and Southeastern Wisconsin MLS rules allow this data to be shared freely. (Search South Central WI and Southeastern WI sold data by selecting "Sold Listings" in the left menu and enter your criteria in the search boxes on our property search page.) In other areas of Wisconsin, the MLS systems require this information to be behind a registration. Home buyers and sellers in those areas will need a free MyFirstWeber account to access that sold data. It’s free and just takes a few minutes to set up the account.
We invite you to try out the sold property data search and hope you find the MyFirstWeber account useful in keeping your eye on your competition. It’s also a convenient way to be notifed of new listings matching your criteria. Try them out and let us know what you think in the comments.