stepping onto the front walkway of "their" future home, rather than visiting someone else’s. Selling a home is about creating love at first sight, from the curb, in those crucial first moments. As I mentioned before, not everyone gets the highest possible price when selling their home. For example, consider two nearly identical ranch homes on Cemetery Road in Santa Rosa. One home (3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, 936 square feet, built in 1957) was described as: "Neat as a pin and ready to go. Complete remodel kitchen w/SS appliances, breakfast bar, flattop stove, beautiful tile. Complete bath remodel. Hardwood floors, replaced windows. Great fenced yard, covered rear patio." It was being fought over at $670,000+. Meanwhile, a comparable 3-bedroom, 1-bathroom, 936-square-foot home, built in 1955 on the same street, sold for $611,800. That’s an almost $60,000 difference—enough to cover the real estate agent’s commission and still pocket extra profit. In this case, hiring an experienced real estate agent and following a well- executed plan made all the difference. We’ll explore this further throughout the book. The key factors that sealed the deal were advising, planning, staging, pre- marketing, strategic marketing, negotiation, and professional expertise.
THE BASIC HOME SALES PROCESS
We begin our look at selling your house for more with a practical examination of how the home-selling process works. We will explore how listing prices are determined and the various ways
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