Welcome to the Selling Southport Podcast. I'm Andrew Wright, principal of Professional Southport since 2008. Real estate isn't just my career, it's my passion with decades of experience. I know what it takes to succeed in the property market. Especially here in Southport, whether you're looking to buy, sell, lease, or invest, you can count on me and my team to deliver strategies that maximize your returns.

Let's dive into today's episode and get you one step closer to your property goals.

Hello and welcome back to another episode of Selling Southport. Today we're talking about something that many sellers notice when they start watching the property market. Some homes seem to sell very quickly, sometimes even within days, while others stay on the market for months. So what actually causes the difference?

Is it the property itself, the marketing, the price, or something else entirely to help us understand what's really going on? I'm joined by Andrew Wright from Professional Southport. Andrew has been selling real estate in the Southport area for around 20 years and has seen thousands of buyer interactions during that time.

Andrew, is this something many sellers worry about? Why do some homes sell quickly while others seem to sit on the market for a while?

Well, the most obvious one is, uh, the pricing of the property. So, obviously, buyers, uh, have a buy box what they're looking for, and they have a budget, what they're approved to borrow to, or cash in the bank.

And, uh, pricing it correctly at the start of a listing campaign is very, very important. Obviously, the type of property also matters. If it's a free standing house with a large block of dirt, it's probably gonna attract a little bit more money than a, uh. An apartment in a complex with uh, 200 that are exactly the same because of the scarcity factor.

So type of dwelling as well as the location makes a big difference on the amount of demand.

Sure. Because I guess the price, you actually set something sellers, center farm. Don't think about what goes on in the buyer's mind. 'cause the seller's thinking, I want to get the top dollar, I want to price this potentially as high as I.

I can, but explain to me what goes on in a buyer's mind when a property first hits the market and they see a price.

Well, well, during the buyer's mind, they're thinking exactly the opposite. So the seller is, I want to get the best price possible, and the buyer wants to get the best price possible. So they've already got a price limit that they're able to buy to, but they're also, in many cases, uh, more educated than the sellers on what the other comparable properties have been selling for, because some of them.

Have been out there doing open homes for six months and still haven't purchased yet, so they know exactly what a property's worth and they just won't turn up if you price it too high.

Yeah. So you're knocking people out from the, from the very start.

Well, you're at least knocking them out now, because some of those people who think it's price too high, but if the property meets their buy box, they may well say, well, I'll keep an eye on that one and I'll wait for the owner.

To drop the price before I go and inspect it.

Right. Because it, I think, you know, a very valid point you've made, there is a lot of the buyers have been Yeah. Looking for a long time. They know what things are are worth. That's right. And when a seller comes into the market, they haven't been looking, they're thinking about their own home.

Well, they may have been, uh, looking, but they may have been looking for their next purchase, which is often in a different geographic area or a different type of property, and probably in a completely different price range.

Now on the flip side, if you price a property correctly or even maybe slightly below, and you've got this group of buyers around it, they're gonna jump quickly, aren't they?

'cause suddenly, hang on, here's a potential bargain.

Yeah, that's exactly right. So it's, it's about pricing it correctly to generate that competition, because when you're doing an open home, let me tell you, it's a lot different atmosphere if there's 20 or 30 people there compared to one or two. And our role is to create competition.

And even though it seems almost, uh, counterintuitive to price a property lower, if you can get 30 people turning up to an open home instead of two or three, you're probably gonna get up, end up with a better result. It's also important at the same time with your strategy as well as the pricing that you don't skip investment in professional photography.

To get the buyers to the property, you have to get them there in the first few weeks. So photography is important, and even though you can't always do, do this with, uh, tenanted properties, it's probably best to make sure the property is vacant as well, because sometimes tenants don't present a property as well as an owner.

OC could

be,

and if they've got another 12 months left on a lease, you're probably also missing out on those. Buyers who wanna live in a place. And at the moment, because of the housing crisis, those people are looking for somewhere to live. Well almost certainly offer a higher price to you than an investor.

Sure. Now talk to me about those first two, uh, first few weeks. 'cause they are crucial, aren't they? I mean, probably listings get pushed to the top on, on, you know, on realestate.dot com, you and those sort of things. And it's when all the activity happens, you don't want to miss that window, do you? Which again, is why pricing is so important from the outset.

Look, when I did my first, um, real estate training in, uh, 19, uh, 92, when I became an agent, the first thing they taught us when we're selling property is, look, if a property is overpriced, you must get a price reduction from the seller after two weeks or within two weeks, because if you leave it longer than that, there's the, the listing will go stale and in realestate terms on realestate.com.

Instead of being on page three or four, it's on page 10, and a lot of buyers just won't see it.

So I just wanna come back to something you mentioned before because this is something I truly believe a lot of sellers don't realize, and me and it me as a lay person, I would think this, and it wasn't until I started speaking with a lot of real estate agents that I do fully understand this, and that is pricing lower than expected rather than overpricing.

And just how that. That is critical.

Well, look it, it is critical because at the end of the day, if we don't get the competition through the open homes, we're not gonna get the mold full office. So if you are marketing a price at an auction, you don't need to worry about the pricing. Okay? We'll give you buyer feedback every week and the day before the auction.

You can set a reserve price based on the feedback from your agent and from the market. But if you are marketing with a price. It is very important that we maximize the amount of inspections so we can provide as much competition to you as possible. And make no mistake about it, the best result for you will come when your agent rings you and say, guess what?

We've got multiple offers at the same time. And that's where our process is. We write to each of the buyers and say, look, we have multiple offers. The seller would now like to invite you to put in your highest and best offer by 6:00 PM tonight. Otherwise the property's going to be sold. And I can tell you from experience that during that process, I've even had someone who was already the highest bidder offer another $50,000 to purchase a price because we had multiple offers.

Now, if we'd had let the property go stale and that process was three months down the track, there wouldn't have been a second offer to allow that multiple. Offer a process to take place.

And if they've seen price reductions consistently, they're probably thinking, oh, I'm gonna, I'm actually now gonna low ball this even further.

That's exactly what happens.

Yeah. Well, this is probably a good chance for me to, to wrap up and make a note that we, we are actually doing the next episode. Um, hang out for it, is what, what buyer feedback actually tells you.

Yeah. I'll just say one other point that I neglected to mention there, Adam. One of the strategies.

A lot of the sellers listening to this podcast might think, oh, you know, that agent's just trying to get a commission. He, he wants us to drop the price. What are we, are we cutting our own feed off by dropping the price too much? Well, one of the things you can do is instead of pricing your property too high and expecting bias to negotiate down because.

Buyers might think, well, I can always, um, drop the price.

That's their mindset.

What you might want to consider is an offers over strategy. So instead of listing it at 9.99, when the property's worth nine 50 go offers over 9 25, and then buyers can can see that, oh, this seller's being realistic. You know, that's probably reasonable value at that price and an offer's over.

A lower figure can often attract more inspections and an owner thinking, oh, I can always drop the price. So let's, let's put up a high price to start off with.

Yeah. Look, really valuable information, Andrew. 'cause again, as a lay person, um, who's sold one or two properties in, in my life, um, when someone mentioned to me the very first time offers only, I thought, well, isn't that showing my hand at what I'd actually take?

And it it's a really funny game that the whole way psychology actually works. You know, it's, it's quite often the, as you've just explained in this episode, it's the opposite of what a, what a seller is actually thinking. So thank you so much. Now look, if you are thinking of selling your property and would like to understand what buyers are currently paying in the Southport market, Andrew is always happy to have a conversation with you and share his local insights.

Give him a call, get a free appraisal. And, um, look, get the right man on your team, Andrew. Thanks again, Andrew.

Get

the right, the right man for your team. Very good. It's my new slogan, new slogan. Andrew's right for you. We could, we could, we could go on forever. I get the right advice. I think they've saying wrap this up right now.

Thanks mate, and we'll talk to you on the next one. Thanks Adam.

Thanks for listening to the Selling Southport podcast. I hope today's episode has given you some valuable insights and practical advice on the local real estate market. Whether you're looking to buy, sell, lease, or invest, I'm here to share my extensive experience and guide you every step of the way.

If you have any questions or want to discuss your next property move, don't hesitate to reach out. Your success is my priority. Stay tuned for more expert tips and updates on the Southport property scene.