[5-DayForum] The results are in....

[Frederika Valle]

A couple of weeks ago I found out about Bill's book and I offered my services to a person who called me because they were interested in selling their property. Well, I've been reading the posts and studying the book, taking into account all information and here's how the auction went....
   
  I started advertising a week in advance instead of the Wednesday before. We staged the house (we got a lot of complements on the staging). I got all of my calls including more on Saturday and Sunday. I put ads in the Pennysaver, Los Angeles Times, Daily News, La Opinion (spanish Newspaper), some online websites, flyered some parking lots, and on  Saturday and Sunday we had 5 people standing on various street corners holding huge signs that said "House Auction Today". I spent at least $500 in advertising; more than likely more than that.
   
  Judging from the number of bidding rules handouts I had left over, on Saturday I had about 38 people visit (not including the family members that they came with) and on Sunday I had about 40. Sunday at 5pm I had 21 bidders on the bid sheets. Come Round- Robin time, 8 of those people were unreachable including two people who wrote down fax #'s even though I told them that I needed a number that would be good for 8pm (why write down your name if you really don't want to bid?). After the first 2 rounds about 5 people dropped out. Then it eventually came down to two main bidders. 
   
  The home was an older home built in 1950, so it has smaller rooms and closets; however, it was recently upgraded and it has a large patio with a swimming pool and a finished garage. It is also located in a prime residential area. The way that the book tells you to price the home is 50% - $500 from what you actually would like as your minimum. I saw forum postings saying that most people got 20-30% less than their desired . I took this into account and added another $50k to the starting bid. Unfortunately the bidders were still $100k less than the reserve that the owner wanted. Because of this, the owner wasn't able to accept the highest bid. Realistically the owner was still a little high, but the bidders were also very low. People know that the market is not so great  and are really trying to get as much as possible for as little as possible.
   
  Reflecting on all of this---- With the market the way it is, this is not the way to go right now. It's a great method and might still work in emerging markets where things are starting to go up, but where things are leveling off or going down, it's not the time. Now, if you have equity in your home that will allow flexibility with numbers, this still could work for you as well. But for those who MUST SELL NOW and need a price that's close to market, save yourself the advertising costs! Try to lease option or hold on to the property if at all possible. Some good things did come out of the process: I got the experience; I handed out a few business cards for investing; I got some new names for my buyer's list; and I even got a few offers from people to stage their property for them!
   
  Now I must bid adieu, because I haven't slept much in the last 4 days due to the auction preparation!
   
  -Rikki
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