Tell me if this price will move my 1 br

I'm really sorry you need to sell in this environment. This is a very difficult question. Normally, I would give you the advice I used when selling my apartment (which worked brilliantly): bring in five brokers with good reputations, and ask them to price the apartment. Take the lowest price, and use that broker, but take an additional 5-10% off the ask. Get people interested in the property, and either get a bidding war going, or create a fake bidding war (perfectly legal).

The problem with this advice is that in this environment there is just so little interest in apartments that I don't think any reasonable price will guarantee that you get a sale. You would definitely not be selling yourself short if you ask $625,000, but honestly, I just have no idea if you will be able to generate interest at that price.

One important question: is your apartment on a similar floor to 16k? If you are a lot lower, I would say that combined with the difference in apartment condition you would want to ask around 600k--and again, no guarantee you will generate interest. If you are on a similar floor, 625,000 might be ok.

I am lower, but views are similar

p.s. I am sorry too, but I have no choice really

that's a great block but who knows in this environment. have you thought about renting until things stablize?

I have thought about renting, but if I sell at around $600,000, I still have a pretty big gain and don't want to lose the tax free gain of $250,000. I've heard that if you give it up as your primary residence, you lose that deduction. I am not in the mood to lie to the INS either.

((Get people interested in the property, and either get a bidding war going, or create a fake bidding war (perfectly legal)).

Not cool.

I'm not an accountant, but have done a sale or two or three. Seems the rule for the $250,000 gain exclusion applies if the property has been your primary residence for two of the last five years.

But, with the money involved here, I'd check with a real tax guy and not just me!

Renogirl --

the tax rules are that you need to have called the residence your primary for TWO out of the FIVE years prior to the sale -- so you could wait if you wanted.

As far as pricing, I can't give too much pricing guidance on apartments I haven't seen, but it might help you to know that 9K -- with an updated kitchen -- sold for $690K in the spring.

Realize that the pullman kitchen in this line is not going to be for everyone, so that will likely add a couple of months on to the sales time.

Good luck!

ali r.
{downtown broker}

What is a fake bidding war? Lying to prospective buyers?

Hard to get a bidding war going in this market -- where we're seeing thin volume -- and poor advice for a FSBO.

ali r.
{downtown broker}

It will sell for what someone is willing to pay so it really doesn't matter what you ask for.
Why not put it at 595K, have two weekends of open houses, and see if someone will pay more.
Nobody is buying unless they feel they are getting a deal.

Kgg, that is probably the best advice--and basically the advice I gave, remember. I don't see how you get a sale these days without a very aggressive price.

thanks for your comments. I guess I will try what kgg suggests. There seems to be no harm in at least trying.

I think $595K is starting a little low, and you're going to be deluged with offers at $525K -- but report back and tell us what happens!

ali r.
{downtown broker}

Sorry to hear you need to sell. My only advice is think a lot about price before picking one (and don't be too quick to undersell yourself). We decided to sell our place on the UWS this past May and wanted to try and do it FSBO. I picked a price based on nearly identical comps in the building that were actually in K at the time (and I knew the actual K price as they were my neighbors). Needless to say, I thought I had the price right. After a lame (no advertising or open houses, etc.) attempt to sell it by sending an email/pictures to lots of friends, we hired one of the bigger brokers (and a broker who had actually sold us the apt. 2 years earlier and also sells most of the units in the bldg.) He came in and suggested a price about 7% more than I was willing to take via FSBO. We took his advice on a couple interior design things to get the apt. looking nice and he got a full ask offer within 3 weeks. So, since he priced it higher, we walked away with more $$ because the increas covered the 6% fee.

Not saying this will work for everyone (I think we had a lot of luck and closed in Sept./before the latest crash), but there can be some value in using a good broker (if you can find one). This same thing happened to us when we sold a house, so I am 0 for 2 and trying to outsmart the system. Good luck.

9K -- with an updated kitchen -- sold for $690K in the spring.

-- It was sold on March 12, that means they started negotiations and went in to contract sometime in January. It was VERY different market.

elena
(broker)

I am not so sure about trying to sell it yourself. When I sold my apartment my broker brought in many people over a short period of time. It cost 6% but I got my price. You can hire a broker who specializes in your area and advertise it as quick sale -- motivated seller, etc. Good luck. be glad your concern is taxes... and not a loss.

"you're going to be deluged with offers at $525K"

take it if so! it seems that you would still have a profit. unemployment is only gonna go up in nyc which could increase the supply of 1 br to the stratosphere while demand will just dry up.

as they say "nobody ever went broke for taking a profit"

elena, I agree with you that January was a different market than now, but I still don't agree with pricing a unit new-to-market 15% lower than a January comp out of hand.

I think the starting place is to do what starfish did, and comp against apartments that have recently gone into contract.

one thing that has been quite noticeable to me about the past four-five months is the extent to which buyers are "anchored" to whatever the seller's price is. We find as a firm that we are getting lowball offers on places that are priced aggressively, but also lowball offers on places that are priced reasonably.

Given that it seems to be buyer psychology that they want a discount off list, I would advise this seller to not take her initial list price too low.

ali r.
{downtown broker}

Better to be the first person to unbid current comps then the last. Keep us posted.

If I do go with a broker, what is the usual listing time I have to commit to? Could I negotiate something where I make it clear that I want the place in contract in 1 1/2 month or else the broker loses the listing? Is there any room on fees, like for example, 6% on the listing, but they have to find me a rental and give me a good discount on their fees on that?

p.s.: what Ali. r. says about the anchored buyers makes a lot of sense to me, so I'll be careful to account for that

I would be surprised if any of the big brokers give you that short a time. They do actually do some work and would probably not want to risk their time for really only a month to find a buyer in this market. Also, we tried to get below the 6% fee, but were mostly unsuccessful (you can certainly get them down on the 6% if they sell it by themselves without a buyer's broker though). We did get our broker to rep us on the rental and give us his piece for free - so we paid 7.5% on the rental and not the 15% they wanted (that ended up being equal to about .6% of the broker fee on the sale, so it was kind of like paying 5.4% to sell vs. 6%.

call me crazy but the k line doesn't have a kitchen. The area is great but a pullman kitchen.

avg time on market is five months heading towards six . . . you can quiz different brokers whether they would sign a shorter exclusive; I personally would not. One reason for that is that some of the expenses involved in marketing an apartment come up front -- why pay the photographer to get great shots and the web designer to build a nice site, only to hand it over to somebody else?

Also, psychology is really weak right now, so any lawyer is going to take a month to do due diligence before signing the contract . . .so you are basically looking for an accepted offer within two weeks. There is one easy way to do that, which is to underprice the unit.

While I recognize your urgency, I would caution you to stop and think whether you want to achieve speed at the expense of giving away $10K that should be yours.

A more realistic time-frame is to price the unit accurately minus a dollop for a quick sale, to allow four to five weeks to an accepted offer, a month for contract signing, and two months to close. That would put you in February, which I know is not what you want to hear, but I can't think of a good agent who wouldn't want an exclusive contract for at least that long.

Real estate *commission* is a different story. Commissions are always supposed to be negotiable, and in a world where there are few sales and you're realistic about pricing, you are more than ever in the driver's seat. Ask for discounts.

ali r.
{downtown broker}

I have a kitchen, small but with a window, a full size fridge and 24 inch stove; small, but it is NOT a pullman kitchen

happyrenter--creating a fake bidding war is legal? I don't think so. Besides being against the law (fraud being one count), I personally would sue if I found out that I had been lied to about other bids. Does anyone wonder why we are in a financial crisis with "advice" such as this?

What was the recent news I heard? Prices are down but sales are up 5% or so. I'd be angleing to get Ali to represent me; you can't do better than that!!! In a time of such chaos & uncertainty, isn't it all the more reason to have a wise, trained & experienced professional on your team?

Ali you are awesome. please keep posting here - your information is invaluable! (and, as I've said before, GREAT book)

Given the accelerated time frame, if you do hire a broker, perhaps you should consider structuring compensation to provide incentive to sell quickly. E.g., you could provide a bonus for delivering a signed contract within 6 weeks.

Given how quickly it sounds like you need to sell, perhaps the thing to do would be to try to FSBO for 2 weeks while interviewing prospective brokers (in case you don't find someone quickly on your own).

reno...sorry, it looked like a pullman...but bottom line, it's a great area and a terrific bldg. You really need to price it correctly and you'll sell quickly.