These three items seem to elude both agents and home owners alike so I have dubbed them - secrets.  The art of selling a Kingsland or St. Marys, Georgia home is not rocket science and is really not much of a secret if you like to face facts.  The concepts, when used properly can sell a home very effectively and for the most amount of money.  Since I have become so experienced with these concepts, of course I use them to the advantage of my home selling clients.

These concepts are the foundation of my "Your Home Sold in 99 Days" strategy and it works very effectively.  Whether you need to sell in 9 days, 99 days, or 199 days please read this entire page.  It does not matter what the current hype or doom - the concepts contained on this page are effective in every type of real estate market.

For more information on my "99 Day Sales" please read this entire page, then email me or call me.  We can arrange a time for a personal market analysis on your home to determine our purchase price.  If you are in a serious situation I strongly urge you to read the page on avoiding foreclosure and then contact me as soon as possible at 912-322-1350.

Back to the subject of the three secrets:  These so called "secrets" are the same throughout the North American real estate markets and you would think that the masses would have figured this out by now.  Maybe they have figured it out and simply want to believe they can fall into success.  If you are a home owner (or a competing agent researching my site) who is hoping to get lucky with Georgia Real Estate and Home Sales, you may want to look elsewhere for the ignorance is bliss approach.  My approach to selling Kingsland and St. Marys, Georgia Real Estate is more in line with the chance favors the prepared mind approach and is presented below...

How do you effectively handle your Kingsland or St. Marys Georgia Home For Sale?

On this page you will learn the three things that must happen to sell your Kingsland or St. Marys Home.  These three things, done correctly, will sell your home for the most money every time.  They are virtually guaranteed to work!  You can do them on your own or you can hire an agent to do portions of them for you.

• Accomplish None of these and you will almost guarantee failure or cost yourself money!
• Do only one of them and you will find minimal success.
• Do two of them and you will find moderate success.
• Do all three of them and you will find the most profit in the least amount of time! 

You can use these concepts and sell your home in a HOT Georgia Real Estate Market or a slow Georgia Real Estate Market.  The concepts are universal and adjust to market extremes readily.  You will profit by taking these concepts seriously and implementing them to the best of your ability.

Secret #1: Your St. Marys or Kingsland, Georgia Home For Sale MUST be presentable.

Whether you decide to sell your Georgia home by owner or hire an agent, this item rest squarely on your shoulders.  An agent is not going to come to your home and trim the bushes, mow your yard, wash the dishes, or empty the ash trays.  You must take the time to make your home presentable.  Curb appeal and first impressions matter - a lot!

If you are planning on selling your home and need some insight to your home's curb appeal, ask a friend, neighbor, or your real estate agent to drive up to your home as if they were going to buy it themselves.  What strikes them?  Do they get the impression they want to see more of the home or do they simply resign themselves to going through the home out of obligation.  Does the home need fresh paint?  Is there a nice balance of shrubs and/or flowers?  Is the grass green or is it brown and patchy?

Once inside is the home neat, clean and presentable?  How are the odors?  Does the home smell fresh or like dogs?  Do the carpets look clean and presentable or do you need to have them professionally cleaned?  Is the home packed with material possessions creating a sense of clutter or is it decorated in a balanced way that creates as sense of "home"?  (Being too de-cluttered can also be harmful so don't put too much in storage.)

You may hire a landscaping company, home decorating professional, or a weekly maid service to handle many of these details.  Personally I have found most home owners can handle these items themselves and by investing a few days and a few hundred dollars on flowers or bushes, home owners improve the curb appeal of their home dramatically and get more interest from potential buyers. Handling Secret #1 properly  will directly impact how to approach Secret #3 covered below. 

Secret #2: Your Kingsland or St. Marys, Georgia Home For Sale MUST Have Exposure!

If potential buyers do not know your home is for sale - they can not buy it!  Many people buy a home on a cul-de-sac to avoid the high traffic patterns and then wonder why their "for sale by owner" sign or their real estate agent's sign is not creating a flurry of home buyers.  Whether the home is listed with a real estate agent or by owner the exposure must consist of more than a for sale sign!

In contrast, a home may be on a busy street and create a flurry of attention but no offers.  This is most likely because the buyers, although they found the home, would rather raise their family on a cul-de-sac.  It is truly the proverbial "double-edge sword".  Again, to truly find the right buyer, willing to part with many thousands of dollars for your home, the exposure must consist of more than a for sale sign!

So how do you create marketing exposure to get your Kingsland or St. Marys home noticed?  My advice is two fold.  First is the "For Sale By Owner" strategy and then the Real Estate Agent approach.

For Sale By Owner:  In order to effectively expose your home quickly, you must use many of the traditional methods that real estate agents use.  I state "traditional methods" because the modern Internet methods, although much, much more effective, take months or years to gain traction.  You probably don't have two years to invest in your home for sale marketing campaign so you will need to use the traditional print methods.

The traditional print methods and their costs are:

• For Sale Sign...$10 - $20.
• The Real Estate Book...approximately $389 per month.
• Coastal Real Estate Magazine...approximately $289 per month.
• Classified section of at least one local newspaper...approximately $50 per month.
• Direct Submission to the Realtor's Multiple Listing Service...$500 for six months.
• Offer 3% Co-op to agents that bring a buyer (the majority of buyers are working with agents so if you opt not to co-op 3% you will lose 90% of all the buyers in the Kingsland and St. Marys Real Estate Markets).

The best estimate with these traditional methods (combined with proper implementation of secrets #1 and #3) is around 120 days to closing.  Assuming you are selling an average Camden Home at $175,000 it will cost you around $3432 for the exposure/marketing side and $5250 for the co-operating buyer's agent.  Total Cost to Sell is $8682.  This is a savings of $1818 when compared to hiring an agent and if you sell directly to an unrepresent buyer you save an additional 3% by avoiding the co-op.

It is also important to know that traditional print advertising is quickly becoming obsolete for both home owners and real estate agents.  As of 2003 (which is a million years ago in technology) the Internet surpassed the newspaper as the primary source for real estate researchers.  

Real Estate Agent Approach: Hiring a real estate agent to sell your Kingsland or St. Marys home has drawbacks and perks.  The drawbacks exist when hiring an agent that does not know how to provide quality Internet marketing.  When that happens you are simply getting the same strategy suggested in the previous paragraph on "For Sale By Owner" without any chance to experience the financial savings.  Worse yet, because the agent does not know how to fully implement these three sales secrets you find yourself wanting to fire your agent or your home's listing contract expires without a sale and you are back to square one. 

The perks of hiring an agent come when you hire an agent that knows these three home selling secretsand can provide you with marketing for the modern Internet age.  The cost of hiring such an agent is typically the same as the cost of hiring the agent that is hoping to get lucky.  When you contact an Internet Savvy Agent you simply discover someone who has invested time and energy learning how to get the job done with quality online exposure and has created the Internet traction required to make their website(s) visible to the most important search engines such as Google and Yahoo. 

Rather than go into paragraph after paragraph on the Internet strategy that has made me so successful, I will simply leave you with the point that "secret #2" is all about the importance of exposure.  Either traditional exposure that, although still moderately effective is quickly becoming obsolete, or through exposure such as my Superior Online Marketing that has proven to sell homes faster and for more money.  You must have exposure!

For the home owner that is determined to try to sell by owner without exposure I encourage you to read my page on "For Sale By Owner" to give yourself a fighting chance at avoiding the costly pit falls.  The page will describe the pit falls and give proven strategies on how to avoid becoming a victim of them.

Secret #3: Your St. Marys or Kingsland, Georgia Home For Sale MUST Be Priced Correctly!

It is possible to price yourself too high and get less money than your home is worth.  YES - you read that correctly.  Price Too High = Get Less Money!  This happens to For Sale By Owner sellers and sellers that hire an agent alike.  It is one of the most difficult concepts for people to grasp and, unless you make it a point to do months of research on the "physchology of buyers," you are simply going to have to read this information with a level of trust.

Many home sellers believe they can price their home high and buyers will negotiate with them.  This is only true if the home is priced in the correct range to begin with.

For example: imagine a typical home in your neighborhood is worth between $190,000 and $207,000.  The home owner has done all of the suggestions from Secret #1 and Secret #2 and then priced the home at $205,900.  Buyers will see the home as very desirbale (Impressions of #1), actually find the home and conduct research on it (Exposure of #2) and see it as a value worth pursuing (Pricing of #3).  Buyers are willing to pay at, or near, the original list price because they recognize the value and the seller is less likely to negotiate because they are confident it is priced at the TRUE VALUE of the home.

On the other hand, given the same situation imagine the home seller prices the home at $229,900 hoping to get more money.  Home buyers view the home (either online or in person).  These home buyers are looking to buy a home from $225,000 to $250,000 and when they see this home they compare it to the other homes in the $225,000 to $250,000 price range.  This over-priced home is simply not in the same league with a home correctly priced in the range; homes which boast more size, different neighborhood, added luxuries or amenities, etc.  The buyers do not make an offer because there is no value and it does not compare to the others they have seen.

Now let's assume the seller gets a grip on this and lowers the price to $205,900.  Although this price is now realistic the seller has been dealing with this for months and has reached frustration.  A savvy buyer's agent sees the home is now within range, but also recognizes that the home is stale from the over-pricing.  The savvy buyer's agent shows the home to an interested buyer and at the agent's advice the buyer makes an offer of $195,000.  After a few counter-offers between buyer and seller the seller resigns themselves to take $199,900... a full $6,000 less than true value and only after experiencing months of frustration.

Now these illustrations are pretty rudimentary, but that does not make them less true.  As part of my desire to serve my sellers and get them the most money for their home, I have made it a point to understand these concepts.  I make it a point to understand "buyer psychology" and real estate negotiations to maximize my seller's profits.

For further guidance on this topic you can request a "home evaluation" that is based on actual home sales in your neighborhood.  The evaluation will help you price your home in the correct range to begin with and leave you to work on secrets #1 and #2. 

Wrapping-up the Kingsland and St. Marys, Georgia Home Selling Topic:

If you want the most money for your home in the least amount of time you must follow all three secrets.  Accomplishing none of them will be utter failure.  Accomplishing one or two of them will help you be successful but not allow you to maximize your profit.  Below you will find a little light shed on the mix and match concept:

Accomplish #1 and #3 and you will not reach buyers.  You will have a clean, presentable home that is priced correctly but no one knows it.  The few buyers you reach will usually be investors or savvy buyers looking for discouraged sellers and they make a lower offer.

Accomplish #2 and #3 and you will reach quality buyers with a property priced correctly.  In this situation the proper price is probably less money than a comparable home that has been spruced-up via secret #1.  This is not necassarily bad if you do not have the cash to fix the home, but if you do have the resources to spruce it up you can maximize your profit.

Good luck with your Georgia Real Estate endevours.  If would like to discuss how I can accomplish all of this as your real estate agent at an affordable commission, please feel free to contact me via email at paul@royal-skies.com or by phone at 912-322-1350 (cell).