agent suggestions needed for the southern part of La Jolla

[cantab]

We are thinking of listing our house in the Bird Rock school district for sale. There are many high profile agents who specialize in this area. Any suggestions on how to choose one to handle the listing? Suggestions about specific names are welcome too–I’m not sure if that is considered kosher for this forum.

These are some considerations, in no particular order:
– good photos in the listing
– correct spelling and grammar: no “peak view”
– easy for other agents to reach and deal with
– widespread, effective advertising
– not: low price to make the house less work to sell
– not: high price to get the listing, then pressure to lower the price
– specializes in SFRs between $1M and $2M
– experienced in the southern slopes of Mt Soledad, from Bird Rock to the freeway.

We are willing to go with a full-service agent and a 6% commission. Are there any standard selling expenses that the owner pays in addition to the commission? Does the commission include all advertising costs?

What is the standard CBB? Many listings seem to say 2.5% CBB. Does this mean that the listing firm keeps 3.5%? Is 3% CBB a better incentive for non-listing agents to bring in purchasers?

We are willing to do pre-inspections and anything else that will help the house sell quickly. What is recommended?

Ideally, we want to move out of the house and close the sale between June 15 and June 30. What date should we target for the house to appear on the MLS?

Thanks for any advice!

[livinincali]

[quote]
widespread, effective advertising
not: low price to make the house less work to sell
[/quote]

Not sure this matters at all. Every serious buyer is going to be checking the MLS daily. Putting a effective ready to go listing (i.e. good pictures included, maybe a walk through video) is pretty much all you need now. A hot listing is a new listing.

[quote]
not: low price to make the house less work to sell
not: high price to get the listing, then pressure to lower the price
[/quote]

A buyer determines the price. I’d probably list it a little lower than comps and just make sure you have an agent that knows how to manage multiple offers (bidding war). That way you can be pretty sure about moving June 15th to June 30th.

You list it on May 1st. Get your multiple offers in. Pick a buyer and do a 30-45 day escrow.

[ljinvestor]

I sent you a PM

[SD Realtor]

There are alot of large volume producers that you can pick from down there. You should not have a problem finding one. Ask the ones you interview to bring you a list of recent transactions (that they have performed) for the area you live in.

Agreed big time with what cali said about advertising. Unfortunately we are not in the age where mailers and magazines sell homes.

The commission you pay covers everything. If they try to add ancillary costs (for instance you will want them to send a professional photographer to shoot the home) make sure you don’t get stuck with that cost.

You pay essentially two commissions, a listing commission and a coop commission (the CBB you referred to). I personally feel that 2.5% is a good cbb. As an exercise, as the agents you interview to bring you the breakdown of the cbb for the last 3 months of sales in the area. That way you can identify if there is a strong skew towards 2.5% or 3.0%. My guess is you will find that about half are 2.5 and half are 3.0.

You can try to negotiate that if the listing agent also becomes the selling agent (selling agent = buyers agent), then the CBB is reduced. Some listing agents will go for that, some will not. You can even be ambitious and try to say that if the selling agent comes from the same office or same company that the CBB will be reduced. Again, unlikely but you can try.

Essentially 6% is meaningless. Think of the commissions as independent and try to get each one as low as possible or at least one of them.

Pre-inspections are never a bad idea. Get a physical inspection, and a termite inspection. The termite inspection should be free. The physical inspection will run you around 400-600 depending on the size of the home.

Get the home on the market asap. Do not wait until May. I cannot stress this enough. You wait til May you lose out on the large pool of buyers who are starting to look for a home NOW. If that means you do a rent back or a long escrow or a combination of the two, then do it.

Make sure your agent gets a professional photographer.

[joec]

The comment about selling now is also probably because people looking to go to that school district probably needs to establish residency BEFORE May…for the next school year so I’d agree that if you list it now, you’ll get everyone that wants to be in that area while some would have made the move already…

and we know what parents are willing to do for their kids…

[SD Realtor]

It was simply stat based. Trditionally the 4 months with the highest number of closed sales are March through June. So yes part of it is most likely based on the school year calendar. Part of it may also be because that is when the most inventory or perhaps the best quality of inventory is available. So if you factor in market time and the escrow period, getting the home on the market in February would fall into getting a closing in that timeframe. However…. past performance doesn’t gaurantee future outomes. Also seasonal patterns are easily disrupted by greater events like we saw in 2007-2009 on the slow side and in 2012 – spring of 2013 on the fast side. In both those cases the inventories were skewed. So in a normalized market without substantial external forces seasonal patterns in the past showed statistical higher closings in certain months. As for why? Points like you made have merit. Also conclusion of the holidays, and the end of the previous tax year may have a little influence.

[CA renter]

[quote=SD Realtor]It was simply stat based. Trditionally the 4 months with the highest number of closed sales are March through June. So yes part of it is most likely based on the school year calendar. Part of it may also be because that is when the most inventory or perhaps the best quality of inventory is available. So if you factor in market time and the escrow period, getting the home on the market in February would fall into getting a closing in that timeframe. However…. past performance doesn’t gaurantee future outomes. Also seasonal patterns are easily disrupted by greater events like we saw in 2007-2009 on the slow side and in 2012 – spring of 2013 on the fast side. In both those cases the inventories were skewed. So in a normalized market without substantial external forces seasonal patterns in the past showed statistical higher closings in certain months. As for why? Points like you made have merit. Also conclusion of the holidays, and the end of the previous tax year may have a little influence.[/quote]

Agree with everything SDR said here and above. We’ve also noted the trend of homes selling best between early February and mid-April. I’ve often wondered about this, too, and think that in addition to the above reasons, there tends to be less inventory, especially in February, than there is in the later spring and the summer. The buyers who really want to buy will already be looking, and if there is relatively low inventory, it’s usually a slam dunk for a reasonable seller.

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