The Sale
Name: Brent and Tiffany DeBrock
The home: A two-bedroom, two-bath condo built in 1983.
Where: Smyrna
Why they sold: To buy a single-family home. “When I bought the condo originally in 2005, I was single and it was perfect for me,” said Tiffany, 34, who works in marketing. “I got married and got a dog and thought it would be great to have a house. We thought, ‘Let’s see if we can sell it. We’ll put it on the market and see what happens.’ ”
Time on market: 94 days
Original price: $99,900. “We kept it at the same price the whole time,” Tiffany said, adding that they looked at comparable sales in the Waterford Place complex before setting the price. “We wanted to be smart with pricing to start with and to be realistic. We felt like if we were cutting back on the price, we would just keep going down and down and down.”
Sale price: $90,325
What it took: Repainting, updating and staging the home. Before they talked to real estate agents about selling the home, the couple toned down the green hallway and other brightly colored rooms with a neutral color palette and cleaned the carpets. They interviewed potential agents before deciding on Debbie Sonenshine with Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage because of her marketing plan (from ads to putting fliers up at Starbucks, Panera Bread and the local library) and offer to bring in a stager for free. They replaced the original stove and hooded microwave with new Kenmore appliances. The stager suggested rearranging furniture, such as moving the sofa in the living room to make the room appear larger, and converting the second bedroom from an office into a bedroom.
Potential stumbling block: The buyers requested to move in before the September closing date. The DeBrocks were unsure, having heard stories from friends about the risks of potential squatters. When they learned that the buyers were moving from out of state and their possessions would be arriving the weekend before the Monday closing, they agreed to let them move in two days early.
Seller’s hint: Expect to be lowballed, with buyers seeking at least 10 to 15 percent off the asking price. “Since it is a buyer’s market and there were so many other units for sale, even in our own community, we weren’t shocked we got lowballed,” Tiffany said. “It was definitely frustrating to feel like I was giving my property away, essentially. I tried to think about my end goal, which was that my husband and I were going to find a house and we would end up gaining on the other end.” To avoid taking two mortgages, the couple waited to search for a home until the condo sold in September. They got a four-month apartment lease and found a four-bedroom, two-and-a-half bath home in Marietta to buy, moving in during January.
About the Author
