Your local market conditions dictate the real estate climate around you. Where things are on the buyer’s/seller’s market spectrum will impact how you and your Windermere real estate agent approach selling your home. As a part of this process, it’s important to understand the different types of markets and how their conditions play into accurately pricing your home.

See the latest data on home sales, home prices, mortgage rates and more for your area here:

What is a seller’s market?

The housing market is categorized as a seller’s market when demand for homes is greater than the supply on the market. With limited inventory, competition is high amongst buyers. This drives home prices up, decreases days on market, and often leads to multiple offers from buyers. These are ideal conditions for selling your home, given that buyers are forced to continually sweeten their offers to win out. For example, buyers are often more apt to remove contingencies from their offers in a seller’s market.

Common Real Estate Contingencies

What is a buyer’s market?

A buyer’s market is on the opposite end of the real estate market spectrum. It is usually defined as having six or more months of available inventory—meaning if no new homes were listed, it would take six (or more) months for all available listings to sell.

Because there’s greater supply than demand, there’s less competition among buyers, and it’s the buyer’s agents who often have the leverage during negotiations. Selling in these conditions emphasizes the importance of investing in improving your home before putting it on the market.

High ROI Remodeling Projects to Increase Home Value

Image Source: Getty Images – Image Credit: kate_sept2004

Selling Your Home in a Balanced Market

A balanced market exists in equilibrium between a seller’s market and a buyer’s market. It is the middle part of the Venn diagram between the two; it shares certain aspects of each, but only dips its toes into both.

When your local real estate market is balanced, it’s important to approach the selling process with a realistic mindset. In a balanced market, bidding wars are less likely and the chances of buyers having complete leverage are slim. These conditions, however, are all the more reason to make your home stand out amongst competing listings. Making repairs, remodeling, and boosting curb appeal can all help attract buyers while increasing the value of your home.

When coming out of a seller’s market, it’s important not to panic when your local real estate market experiences a cool-down or a return toward balance. In a balanced market, there are still plenty of buyers actively seeking homes, albeit at a lesser pace. Even as aggregate home sales decline and days on market increase, these market conditions should not be confused with more extreme situations like the housing market crash of the late 2000s.

Our Chief Economist Matthew Gardner covers recent housing marketing conditions as they compare to the Great Recession. Read his analysis in two recent articles:

Working With an Agent to Sell Your Home

All these factors highlight the importance of working with your agent to accurately price your home in a balanced market. Real estate agents have access to the Multiple Listing Service (MLS), which gives them access to a huge network of data on available homes both present and historical. They’ll use this data to conduct a Comparative Market Analysis (CMA) to competitively price your home. To get started, connect with a local, experienced Windermere agent:

Featured Image Source: Windermere Real Estate

The post Selling Your Home in a Balanced Market appeared first on Windermere Real Estate.

In the process of buying or selling a home, you’ll frequently come across the term “MLS.” The Multiple Listing Service (MLS) is a group of regional databases of homes for sale accessible only to real estate agents and brokers. Their ability to access the MLS makes it easier for buyers to find the right home and for sellers to market their listings.

What is the Multiple Listing Service (MLS)?

The purpose of an MLS is to facilitate real estate transactions by connecting real estate agents and making it easy for them to share information about active listings and sold home data. For buyers and sellers, your agent’s access to the MLS means you’ll be connected to the largest network of homes and listing information on the market.

Each MLS shows the homes for sale in a particular geographic area. Listing agents add their clients’ listings to the database—providing photos and detailed information about the property—so buyer’s agents can show them to their clients. The MLS allows for customizable searches, which agents use to easily identify the homes that match their clients’ criteria. The vast amount of historical data available on the MLS is what your agent will use to conduct their Comparative Market Analysis (CMA) to competitively price your home. The listing data in the MLS is fed to real estate brokerage websites, such as Windermere.com, so that buyers can search for homes on their own as well.

Image Source: Getty Images – Image Credit: fizkes

Benefits of the Multiple Listing Service (MLS)

Selling a home is a numbers game. The more potential buyers you can reach, the more likely you are to find the right buyer in a timely manner. After your agent conducts their CMA to determine the value of your home, they’ll upload the listing to the MLS. Here they can add additional information beyond what you would find in a typical listing description, such as showing times, contact information, and more. The MLS provides maximum visibility for sellers by connecting them to buyer’s agents who are actively searching for listings. The MLS has also helped to make the industry more equitable. Small real estate brokerages have access to the same MLS info as large companies, putting everyone on a level playing field.

What is an MLS number?

An MLS number is a unique code for each home listed on the market. It makes it easier for agents to communicate regarding a specific property. To learn more about the MLS, or for answers to your buying and selling questions, connect with a local, experienced Windermere agent today:

Featured Image Source: Getty Images – Image Credit: VioletaStoimenova

The post What is the Multiple Listing Service (MLS)? appeared first on Windermere Real Estate.