In a perfect world, home selling is a linear and predictable process. You place your house on the market, schedule showings with potential buyers, and get your offers. But for those of you trying to sell your home right now and wondering, “Why isn’t my house selling?” you know it’s never that easy.

If you’ve listed your home for sale and it’s been showing but not selling, then it’s time to make some changes, especially if it’s been on the market for more than a month. While several factors like a pandemic can affect the number of days it will take for your home to sell, a property generally sells for the most amount of money in the first 30 days. 

Today’s buyers have become savvier and more discerning. If they find out a house has been sitting on the market for more than the average days to sell, some of them will think, “What’s wrong with it?” Buyers speculate that there may be flaws that are making your home hard to sell to potential buyers.

The longer a listing sits, the lower it’ll drop in market price. Here are four likely reasons your home isn’t selling and how you can fix the issues.

My House Isn’t Selling, What Can I Do?

To find out why your house isn’t selling and what you should do, let’s take a look at the commonly overlooked reasons why a home isn’t selling and effective ways you can turn the odds in your favour.

Overpromising on the property’s features and value

Knowing how to relay your house’s features honestly and enticingly is a crucial part of securing a real estate sale. Unfortunately, sales advertisements may tend to oversell property to capture the attention of potential buyers – often relaying enticing features and overinflated value. By overselling your home to the point of being untruthful, you might be setting yourself up for failure.

This can hurt your property’s prospects in the long run, especially if you don’t meet your buyer’s expectations during an open home. The negative impacts of overpromising are much greater than most people realise, with overpriced property having lower chances (or even zero chance) of getting them off the market. Not only is this stressful and frustrating, but it often requires a remarketing strategy which results in greater upfront costs for the seller.

What can I do?

Wouldn’t you rather have potential buyers come into your home and say, “Wow, this is better than I thought/expected!” rather than the other way around? Be upfront and know how to advertise or promote your home in a positive yet honest light. Better yet, save some little gems for the open home so that when buyers finally check out the property, they’ll have pleasant surprises to reel them in and up their offers.

The price isn’t right

It’s human nature to want to get top dollar for your most valuable asset. But if you’ve wondered one too many times “Why isn’t my house selling?” then it’s high time you look at your asking price.  

One common reason why properties are incorrectly priced is that owners assume similar properties will sell at the same value as previously sold homes or homes in the same location. What they tend to overlook is that property appraisal depends on a number of factors, such as supply and demand, future developments within the vicinity of the property, neighbourhood, and accessibility. The downside is that incorrectly pricing your property by pricing it lower or higher is going to cause income loss, either by selling at a losing price or not being able to sell it at all.

What can I do?

Homes priced correctly from day one always sell for the most money. In a strong seller’s market, you may end up receiving multiple bids that go beyond the asking price. If you overprice your property, you probably won’t see any offers.

Remember to take a look at the comparable sales presented by reputable agents. If you’re planning to DIY your home sale, you can combine your knowledge with a licensed real estate salesperson or a professional appraiser to assess the market worth of your house. Like every other sector that has gone through significant change, inside professionals will always bring value as there’s no replacement for experience and depth of knowledge, said Mike Harvey.

You’re still stuck on the traditional home selling process

Chances are, if you’ve sold a property in New Zealand before, you know the traditional selling process. You engage a real estate agent and resign yourself to handing over a large chunk of your savings to pay for the upfront costs of marketing your home. This covers professional photos, letterbox drops, online listings, brochures for open homes, print media and a sign on your front lawn. Once all of that is settled, it’s a waiting game to see how many potential buyers (if there are any) see the ads and come to open homes. It’s an expensive, time-consuming and often disappointing process.

What can I do?

Now, there’s a better way. Imagine cutting out the middleman – no more paying for professional photos, listings, or glossy marketing material. No more spending thousands of dollars without any guarantee your property will be viewed by real buyers.

That’s what Yelsa Real Estate and Yelsa Connect can do for you. Yelsa is set to disrupt the industry by allowing homeowners to connect with potential buyers instead of waiting for them to respond to your advertisements. All you have to do is list your property on Yelsa Connect. Once you’ve listed your property, you can run the Yelsa Buyer Match and browse the list of registered Buyers who match your property’s description. This lets you gain instant access to Buyers in your area and arrange viewings through the app, helping you sell your home faster.

With Yelsa Real Estate, you work alongside a real estate professional by letting them handle the more difficult aspects of the sale, such as negotiating offers and writing the contract. As you’re in control of how you sell your property, you can sell it faster without spending thousands of dollars on advertising and agent fees.

Work with Yelsa: Pay Only for the Expertise You Need

The recent advancements in technology has rendered the traditional methods of real estate sales outdated. Gone are the days of glossy print listing and newspaper ads. In today’s tech-driven world, posting your listing on the internet is the gold standard for home marketing.

Sometimes, it’s not enough to post your listing on a real estate site and wait for potential buyers to message you. Combine your knowledge with Yelsa’s experienced professionals and modern technology to optimise your property sale for you. The Yelsa system provides you with all the tools you need to do it yourself or sign up for a hybrid service with the dedicated support of a licensed Yelsa real estate agent for negotiations and contract management. The changes make a huge difference to the quality of service people receive and the costs attached to that.

The longer your property sits on the market, the less action and money you’re going to get from it. Work with Yelsa today and discover the quicker and easier way to sell your property.