Price is Right: How to Sell Your Home Now

It's the worst-case scenario for home sellers: To endure price cut after price cut until their houses become stigmatized and hungry buyers smell blood. But how can you avoid this unpleasant scenario in today's troubled housing markets? The answer, experts suggest, is to put your home on the market at the right price, and if it doesn't sell quickly, cut the price deep and fast, so you won't be caught in a downward spiral of price reductions.
Not surprisingly, few sellers want to hear that advice. They'd rather price their homes aggressively and then hope buyers will take the bait. But testing the market simply isn't a good strategy with home prices depressed, sales at a slower pace in many markets and buyers on the hunt for good deals, says Mark Reitman, Chicago sales manager for real estate brokerage Redfin in Schaumburg, Ill.
Buyers today are "looking at every aspect in so much more detail and trying to find out how they can get a lower price," he says.
The high-and-hope strategy is so ill-advised that some brokers won't accept listings they think are overpriced. Among them is Tony Marriott, an associate broker with Keller Williams Realty Professional Partners in Phoenix. Marriott says he shies away from sellers who aren't realistic or won't commit to an automatic price reduction if no offer has been accepted within a few weeks after the home has been put on the market.
"We go into it with a fairly aggressive discussion upfront, saying, 'We are listing your property to sell the property, not to go fishing,'" he says. "We need to have a game plan in place to take the emotion and hand-wringing out of it."(cnbc.com)