Selling Luxury Real Estate - How to Properly Market and Sell a Luxury Listing | Living In Washington
If you have a home that's either very unique or there are special features about it that are not easily seen, or if you feel like it's valued higher than what the story of the comparable sales in the neighborhood would indicate, I think that your agent must take this approach. We often talk in a lot of videos that I do how comparable sales give you the best indication of how you should price your home when selling, and that's the truth most of the time. But what do you do when your home is either nicer or more expensive than any other comparable sales in the neighborhood? Well, that's what we're going to talk about today.
So just earlier this week, we sold this house, beautiful custom home in West Seattle. It closed for 3.45 million dollars, and the sellers built this home themselves, and they did a spectacular job. Everything is top of the line, beautiful finishes, very well planned out floor plan, and the biggest challenge that we had when marketing the home is that a lot of buyers, when they came to tour, they fell in love with the house, but all other homes in the neighborhood have not been selling for over three million dollars.
In fact, there's only a handful of homes that are on the market currently in a similar price range, and just about all of them have been sitting on the market for a long time. So how were we able to get it sold in less than 30 days for basically what the seller was hoping to get? Well, first of all, what we did is what we do for every single listing that we take on, and that's regardless of what the asking price is. We need to make sure that the home is clean, it's well staged, it's in good condition.
We want to make sure the landscaping is dialed in. You've heard me talk about this many, many times because it's so important. So there was no exception here.
When we were done and we're ready to go on the market, it was perfect. It really presented beautifully. One of the biggest differences that we took on when marketing this home as compared to other homes in a similar price range that have not sold yet is that we did not put a key box on the home and we did showings by appointment only with the listing agent present.
So either myself or my colleague were there for every single showing. So why is that important, especially in the luxury market? It's important because when the buyer arrives and we have to be there ahead of time, we have an opportunity to get the house opened up, turn on all the lights, turn on the fireplaces, turn on the music, make sure there's fresh flowers. We're able to do everything that we need to do to ensure that the home is welcoming when they get there, because we know that most buyers buy on emotion.
And with all other comparable homes, even at that similar price range, they all were on a key box. And I have gone through all of them to preview to see how they compare to ours. And I think the challenge that they had is that when I arrived there in many times, all the lights are off.
The house might be too cold or something, or maybe the yard isn't spruced up. It's just basically you show up and the listing agent or the seller has no control over how the house presents when you arrive. And even more importantly than that is for someone to be able to highlight all of the special features that actually increase the value of the home.
So back to this example, when they built this home, I mentioned they spared no expense. So, and we have a very, very long list of all of the things that were added on that would not be easily noticeable. Maybe things like a full home generator, which is an expensive upgrade, the whole house water filtration system.
They spend probably close to $200,000 in window coverings and shades alone. And if you just walk into the home and you don't know to look for those things, you could simply bypass it all. Think it's a beautiful house, but it's more expensive than anything else in the neighborhood and just move on to the next one.
However, with us being present there, we're able to walk with the buyer, highlight all of the special features throughout. And then when they're done with the showing, they very clearly understand why the asking price is what it is. In addition to the special features of the home that we talk about, I'm also able to really help them understand, especially if they don't know the neighborhood, why is that area in general, a great place to live? Maybe it's close to parks.
Maybe the commute routes to major employers are important. Maybe schools are excellent. Maybe there's a great grocery store down the street or whatever the case may be.
I'm able to relay this to them, especially for somebody who doesn't know the area very well, and maybe they're moving into it. But on the other hand, even though this very hands-on approach is helpful and is always utilized when selling luxury real estate, there's a downside. The reason we have key boxes is that when you put a listing on the market, there's an argument to be made that you want to grant access to as many potential buyers as possible to come and tour the home.
So when a key box is on, an agent is able to just schedule an appointment and go and show it at their own leisure. And that way you're able to get a lot more people through the door and hopefully find a buyer sooner. However, in this situation, they would have to reach out to us ahead of time.
We need at least 24-hour notice to schedule an appointment. We need to get there early to make sure the house is set up. So the whole process of scheduling showings is a little trickier.
And as a result, not as many people are able to go through the house. However, when those qualified buyers are there at the house, I feel like it's imperative to be able to be there to address all of their concerns, to highlight all the special features, to sell the neighborhood in order for them to feel comfortable with the price that the seller is asking. And ultimately, us as real estate professionals, that's what we get hired to do.
We get hired to go out and sell your house to a qualified buyer, not just to want to keep up and wait for the offer to come in. So to sum it all up, if you have a home that's either very unique or there are special features about it that are not easily seen, or if you feel like it's valued higher than what the story of the comparable sales in the neighborhood would indicate, I think that your agent must take this approach. So be sure that they are there to help sell your home versus simply put a key box on the house and wait for it to sell itself.
As always, thank you for watching. I'm Darius Encis, your local Seattle realtor friend. I put out weekly videos on my YouTube channel.
So if you haven't yet, please be sure to subscribe. And if you have any questions, you know how to get ahold of me. I'll catch you at the next video.
