In trying to handle the sale of my parents’ Dallas home from Chicago I guess I should have realized that I would encounter the typical real estate myths from my own family members – but I didn’t. I guess I naively thought that they read every one of my blog posts and had bought into the rational approach to selling a home. So I was a bit surprised when the usual nonsense started to come out of the woodwork and I had to shift into “presentation mode”. But it was a real eye opener to see these myths unfold in real time from behind the scenes. Herewith are some of the doozies but I’ve abbreviated the conversations here because they were actually much more painful than you would have the patience for.
From my sister
We went back and forth for about 20 minutes, during which I had to explain that buyers’ agents don’t care which brokerage lists a home as long as it meets their buyers’ criteria and that if they pushed their own listings all the time their buyers would get pissed off.
From my father
From my father/mother
“What about fill in name of friend or relative here. Can’t they sell it?” “Uhhhh. No way. They’re an idiot.”From the entire family
“We shouldn’t price the home that low (525K)” “But that’s all it’s worth” “Yeah, but if we price it that low they will offer us even less money” “Pricing it too high doesn’t mean you will be offered more money but it does mean you may not get any offers” “But the city says it’s worth 680K” “I’m sorry to say you’ve been overcharged for your taxes. Just because the city says it’s worth 680k doesn’t make it so” “But Zillow says it’s worth 610K”I’m not sure if my brother was serious about the Zillow comment or not. He may have just been trying to annoy me.
From my father (after the house didn’t sell in 2 months)
Geez, it reminds me just how incredibly easy it is for people to hook up with the wrong real estate agents for the wrong reasons.
You are much more patient and kinder than I. After those abbreviated discussions above (and I can certain guess how the unabbreviated version went) I would have let them flounder on their own with their own decisions and then had the I told you so moment when they came running to me for help.
Of course that would put your family home sale at risk and I’m sure you have a vested interest in that.
Yeah, the real story is much more sordid and it goes way beyond the logistics of selling the house. Imagine the conversations about dealing with the possessions in the house and when to move my parents out. When it came to those latter issues I made decisions that were painful but necessary and they were not well received. Occasionally alternatives surface and I take exactly the tact that you describe. Inevitably nothing changes because the alternatives are not tenable.