How Experience Can Trump a Neighborhood Specialist When Selling Homes in Cameron Park

A photo collage of multiple homes you may find in Cameron Park, CA. © big stock photo

Repetition in real estate leads to experience and experience leads to smooth transactions, whether I’m selling homes in Sacramento or 30 minutes away in Cameron Park in El Dorado County. Although, I have been in the real estate business for more than 40 years and have no idea, really, how many homes I have actually sold, I stopped to take a look in MLS this morning at my sales since 2010. Just over the last 5 years. Yikes. More than 500 homes, and almost 400 of them were my listings.

That’s invaluable experience for a seller to obtain. That’s also a lot of homes to price correctly.

When I list a home, I visually inspect and walk through the home, typically with the seller at my side but not always. Sometimes sellers live out of state, so I might take along my iPad and FaceTime with them. I pay attention to detail, to what a buyer might object to or fall in love with. I look for defects. You’d be amazed at how complacent people can become, and after they live with a problem for a while, it fades into the background so they don’t even notice it anymore.

I spotted a repair situation when I listed a home in Cameron Park and discussed ways to fix it. Even gave the seller a list of contractors she could contact. We would still need to disclose the repair but at least it wouldn’t stick out like a sore thumb. Then we talked about price.

Now, at first the seller was probably a little bit skeptical. As a top producer Realtor, I don’t sell a lot of homes in El Dorado County, much less record numbers of homes in Cameron Park, and I am not a Cameron Park specialist. Yet, that was not a drawback for the seller because when push comes to shove, when an agent has sold as many listings as I have, that experience counts more than having “neighborhood specialist” experience. Agents call themselves a neighborhood specialist if they’ve sold 2 homes.

Whom would a seller rather hire?

The question at the time of listing was whether to list over a certain price point or under it. Given market movement, I predicted we would receive multiple offers if we priced at the $X99,000, which was top of market but under the next hundred thousand mark. Sure enough, we picked up another 4% through a multiple offer situation and that meant an AS IS sale, too, no additional costs to the seller nor request for repairs after the home inspection. A smooth sailing closing. The seller was moving out of state and did not need more pressure.

Not to mention, it is highly doubtful a “discount” agent would have produced the same results. Hire experience. It pays in ways you can’t begin to imagine.