Home Selling Anxiety
What to Do if Selling a House is Stressing You Out
Written By: Mariko Baerg, REALTOR of Bridgewell Real Estate Group
If you’re looking for a realtor to help you sell a property, call me today!
Feeling home selling anxiety? Is selling a house stressing you out? If so, then you’ve come to the right place.
This blog will provide you with tips and information to lower your home selling anxiety.
We also help by providing resources for generating an offer & selling your home efficiently.
Read on for our top tips to help with home selling anxiety!
Set & understand expectations
Setting and understanding expectations prevents you from any guess work. Anxiety is often caused by a lack of certainty, and fear of the unknown. By setting expectations with your realtor, and understanding expectations on matters like price, average days on market and communication, a huge amount of anxiety can often be relieved.
Choose a realtor that you trust and communicate well with. Set expectations with your realtor on:
- Showing feedback
- Open house times
- Anticipated showing schedules/advanced notice
- Average days on market for your home
- Price & if/when you should consider an adjustment
Remember, it’s your agent’s job to tell you their opinion of market value and update you on the sales/active properties in your neighbourhood that are comparable. They can’t control how hot or cold the market is, and keep in mind that if your home isn’t sold within the average days on market then you may want to use that as a signal that it might be time to adjust your price.
Not everyone is going to love your home, but remember it only takes one buyer. The ultimate success of selling your home only requires that one qualified buyer – so don’t get discouraged or panic if you don’t get an offer overnight. Even if you’re priced right, sometimes it just takes time for the right buyer to pop up.
Think about your home sale rationally
Whether it’s your first home or your long-term family home, there’s always an emotional attachment to your home that allows you to see past the shag carpets, laminate countertops, and grunge.
Do your best to think about your home rationally, and from the eyes of the buyer. Not every one is going to love your pets, or your interior taste, or your renovations (or lack there of) and this could play in to how they feel about your price as well.
Think of this step as setting expectations with yourself. Here are some realities you may have to have to face, but once you face the truth you’ll likely feel a lot less stress:
- Facing the reality that your home needs a serious investment in sprucing, cleaning and staging before putting it on the market. Make a game plan and take set a task for each day, and make sure to factor in the condition of your home in to the price.
- Facing the reality that your home might be worth less than you hoped, and that listing it at your fantasy price when that’s not what the market is indicated is a setup for failure.
- Facing the reality of the feedback from buyers and buyer’s agents on the pros and cons of your home – especially when it comes to price.
Paying attention to what needs to be done upfront and listening to feedback from buyer’s and agent’s regarding your home will allow you to pay attention to any blind spots that you may be missing.
If you’re stressed about your home not selling, then ask your agent for feedback if you haven’t already and really consider what buyer’s are telling you. Are you doing all of these showings and receiving consistent feedback that the price is too high? Rather than stressing about cleaning and showing it only to hear the same feedback, it may save you a lot of time and stress to align your price with the feedback being given.
Facing such realities before your home ever goes on the market might take courage, and might be a little painful, but it’s much less painful and costly than allowing yourself to keep living in fantasy land.
Focus on what you can control, rather than what you can’t
Whatever it is you’re stressed out about… whether it be an upcoming inspection, buyer’s not writing an offer on your property, or keeping the home clean all of the time – the truth is, you have a great deal of power to influence the outcome of what you’re stressed about.
Here are some good examples of things you can control to help lower anxiety around selling your home:
- Make decisions and stick to them. If you’re going to be purchasing a new home as well, make sure you take a deep-dive in to the availability and expectations of your purchase. Selling your home can usually be a lot less stressful when you know where you’re going after and what you can afford.
- Find a great agent that you can communicate well with and trust. Make sure expectations are set with that agent.
- Pay attention to the comparable sales and make a reality-based pricing decision
- Set a timeline on when you’ll list your home and what needs to be done prior to listing. Consider having an agent through to help you plan with home prep, and create a daily task list to chip away at it in a reasonable amount of time rather than rushing to do it all last minute. Consider hiring a professional if you feel you don’t have time.
- Consider what things may come up in an inspection and either decide to have them fixed upfront or sell your home “as is” and disclose the issues now.
- Tell your agent of any blackout times that you are unable to show or any preferences you have for a showing schedule. Do your best to provide abundant access to your home for buyers who want to come see it.
- Create a cleaning list of things that need to be done everyday before you leave the house to make it show-ready in the event you get a same day or mid day showing unexpectedly. Buyer’s that request last minute showings don’t usually expect the home to be perfect, so just do your best to make it presentable every day just in case.
Every time you get the feeling that things are overwhelming or spiralling out of control, consider what it is you’re stressed about and what you can do to control the outcome.
However, it’s also important to remember that some things are just simply out of your control. Rather than stress out about it, acknowledge that you cannot impact the outcome and that you’ve done what you can.
Don’t forget to keep your agent in the loop as well if things are stressing you out. Experienced agents can often propose alternative solutions to almost any problem that might not otherwise even come to mind for you! We’re here to help. There are also plenty of resources for you to pull on for tips on how to prepare your home for sale, how to price your home, and so much more.
Understand that it’s normal to feel anxiety when selling, especially if it’s your first home
At the end of the day, selling what is probably your largest asset is not an easy thing to do! Whether this is your first time selling or 10th time, there is always some aspect of anxiety or stress to selling a home. Once you accept that, it will likely allow you to move past some of that stress a bit.
Keeping communication in check, hiring an agent you trust, talking about your concerns, and setting expectations will ultimately be your best options for reducing your anxiety around selling a home! Our goal at Bridgewell is to make the home selling process as easy, stress-free, and enjoyable for you as possible – and our seller systems have helped plenty of clients to do just that.
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Are you thinking about selling your home? Looking for a consultation on how to prepare your home sale? Considering hiring a new realtor? Call us today at 604-765-0376. Prefer text? 604-319-0200. Or email us at [email protected] to start a conversation!
