When I accept a listing in the Sacramento area — and I sell homes all over the place in Sacramento as far out as Galt, to Yolo County: West Sacramento, Woodland and Davis, including Roseville and Lincoln in Placer County — the very first thought that enters the mind of this Sacramento listing agent is almost always: What is wrong with this listing? What needs to be addressed? In case you’re wondering, my mind works the same way when we receive a purchase offer, and unfortunately there is almost always something wrong with purchase offers as well.

The reason I want to examine the listing so closely is because a buyer will scrutinize the home for sale too. I prefer to handle any objections a buyer may have before they pop up because I know how buyers are. One small drawback, one little defect, one objection, and they tend to latch on to the next house in their buyer’s agent tour. They feel no loyalty whatsoever to the house they’re standing in and looking at. It’s just a house and there is another right around the corner. They aren’t desperately trying to find a way to make the home fit their needs as some sellers believe; au contraire sugar bear, their wants and needs need to fit that particular home.

This is the thing that sellers often do not realize. It’s hard for them to put themselves into the buyer’s shoes, not to mention, let me tell you that not all Jimmy Choo shoes are comfortable, regardless of the price tag. Sellers will say things like, the buyer can always change this, that or the other thing. And no, the buyer won’t. Sellers think buyers will overlook an item because the seller has lived with it for so long and the seller has been able to ignore it, and they absolutely cannot believe it is sticking out like a big sore thumb screaming at buyers to run away.

All agents have different ideas about what these sorts of problems are, and some of the agents are right about them and some are completely wrong. How is a seller to know whom to believe and which agent is off his rocker? Common sense and gut instincts, I guess. Track records speak volumes.

I have more than 40 years of experience in this business, and those years have yielded extraordinary results, a wealth of information. When I am hired as a listing agent, I share all of my suggestions with my clients. Sellers who are shopping for an agent might call in 3 or 5 different agents to look at their home and try to pick everybody’s brain, but it doesn’t really work that way, and agents can tell when sellers are looking for free advice. The agents who provide free advice tend to stay unemployed as sellers pick, pick, pick and then choose the DNA agent.

Any fool can tell a seller her home is beautiful but the true goal is to efficiently tackle the delicate problems with diplomacy. All homes pretty much possess one problem or another. The talented Sacramento listing agent will find a way to either correct that condition or to deflect attention elsewhere.