Introduction

As a real estate investor, your main goal is to make money out of buying and selling property. The most common way to sell property is through listings. This whereby you contact a licensed real estate broker and hire them to look for buyers for your property. The thing about listings is that they have a term limit – it can be for one month, three months or a year. If you're listing is past the term limit you should consider what you can do with expired real estate listings.

The Things you should do after your Listing has expired

1. Why do you want to sell the House?

If your listing has expired without getting a buyer for your home, it’s time to review your reason for wanting to sell. Are you doing so because you are moving to another country or want to buy a bigger house or you need the cash for an emergency? Once you have reviewed the reason, ask yourself if there are alternatives. Perhaps you can rent instead of sell, especially if you plan on coming back to the area.

2. Advertising

Before you decide to extend your listing contract, look at what went wrong with the previous listing’s marketing. Was it you or your agent that failed to sell the product well? Who was your target market and did you do enough research on them? Perhaps the methods you used to market the house were not popular with your target population. Maybe it could have been your direct mailing strategy that was not well received.

3. Appearance

Another reason why your house didn’t sale is condition. Perhaps buyers didn’t like the way it looked. Go out there and visit other houses in your area. Most importantly look at those that have been selling in the same neighborhood. Have they added a fireplace or is there a specific way in which the rooms have been designed? Pay attention to any features that may contribute to a positive outcome from the buyer. Then, try to incorporate such features in your home before listing it again. One thing that always gets the attention of a buyer is the front yard. Make sure that yours is well manicured and maintained.

4. Comments

After your house was first listed, it got some reviews and visits from interested buyers. Most of them had one or two comments about the house. These included things that they liked and didn’t like. Ask your agent to tell you about these comments and go through each one of them to see if they were justified. If there are changes to be made, implement them before you put the house back on the market. As you do so, always remember that clients have a right to voice their opinions, and you don’t have to get mad or defensive over it.

5. Remove all the Information

Once your listing expires, make sure that your agent removes all the details from the Multiple Listing Service (MLS). This is because some agents are very pushy when they realize that you have an expired listing. You may receive lots of unwanted calls from agents that may claim that they want to help you. Remember that you have to find out what went wrong before you decide to take on another agent. Therefore, remove all your information just to be safe.

6. Sit Down with your Agent

Your agent might have done everything right, but your house still didn’t sell. If that’s the case, you may need to adjust your price. You can ask your current agent to perform an analysis of the market to see if your house is actually priced to sell. Depending on your agent’s advice and considering the condition of the home, you can set a price closer to the market average.

Conclusion

Do the following things if your current listing is expired to make sure that you are well prepared for the next listing. Work with your agent and follow his or her advice, then see what happens.