Selling Homes in Bad Locations: SOLD 7511 Georgica Way in Sacramento

7511 Georgica Way, Sacramento, CA 95822 SOLD at $315,000 by Elizabeth Weintraub.

Selling homes in bad locations is one of my specialities as a Sacramento Realtor. Probably because almost every home, when you get right down to it, has a drawback of some sort, and a good sales person finds a way to make that drawback not look so terrible. I always look for the worst thing about a house so I can downplay it. If I don’t know what the worst thing is, believe you me, a buyer will undoubtedly find it and focus on it, and I’d rather beat the buyer to that punchline.

Address it head on and then draw attention elsewhere. Really accentuate the positive aspects. It’s not really that different of a strategy when selling homes in bad locations. Now, everybody has their own idea about what constitutes a bad location. Some sellers are surprised to hear they live in a bad location because they don’t see it that way. After living in the same place for years, the badness seems to become invisible. They become so used to it that it doesn’t exist anymore.

When I initially studied this new listing online, I could see it backed directly to the train tracks. Not only did the train pass by, but high tension power lines were in the back yard, too. The yard itself was fairly small and a large wall loomed as the barrier between the tracks and the house. Not really an attractive setting. The subdivision itself of Hampton Station was created about 10 years ago in the middle of a lower-income neighborhood, and I’m not sure the builders even finished construction. This was at the second wave of the market crash in 2007, just before the big collapse in the market.

The seller bought this home because she moved to Sacramento from out of the area. She wanted an affordable home that was newer with all of the bells and whistles. The lure of the community being brand new and a home nobody else had ever lived in sounded luxurious. She loved the granite counters, wood floors, stainless appliances, formal dining area, all of that space! A train was not important in the overall scheme of things. It was a trade-off.

A tradeoff our new buyer accepted as well. Where in Sacramento can you buy a 10-year old house for $315,000? Especially in a newer community like this close to downtown? I will admit I was getting a little bit nervous because it took me 9 days to sell this house. Most of my listings this year sell in less than a week. But because I am accustomed to occasionally selling homes in bad locations, this one went off without a hitch.

7511 Georgica Way, Sacramento, CA 95822 sold at $315,000 on March 29, 2017. If you’re looking to sell a home in Sacramento, give yourself the edge of hiring a Realtor with more than 40 years of experience by calling Elizabeth Weintraub at 916.233.6759.