In a seller’s market, an owner could throw on a fresh coat of paint, leave much-needed repairs unfixed, and still command up to four times the amount put into the house. Those days are over.

In our current buyer’s market, brokers and agents need to make sure that their sellers understand that in order to sell their homes, repairs need to be made, improvements need to be of high-end craftsmanship, and the property needs to continue to be maintained.

first tuesday take: Brokers and listing agents should push their sellers to order out home inspection reports at the listing stage in order to identify problems and fix them before potential buyers even make it to the door. If your seller doesn’t want to fix and maintain the property in a (buyer’s) marketable condition, your seller better be prepared to price their home on the low end of the pricing spectrum. And if not, your seller should be fired as redundant in the marketplace.

Re: “In Buyer’s Market, the Message Is: Fix It, or Else” from The Washington Post