[5-DayForum] 5-Day Sale in Traverse City, MI

[carter157 at charter.net]

I thought I would update everyone on our sale.  We advertised sale for 2 weeks (we had to postpone the first weekend due to not enough phone calls).  We advertised in the biggest local newspaper and 2 on-line home sale sites.  By Friday of the second week of advertising, we had 24 calls so we decided to go ahead with the open house (we couldn't postpone again due to committments the next couple of weekends).
We had 3 sets of visitors on Sat and 5 on Sun.  5 of the 8 left bids.  On Sun night we began the bidding process.  2 of the bidders dropped out in round 1 and 1 of the bidders was unavailable.  The remaining 2 bidders upped the ad price (50% of what we had the home listed with a realtor) by $4K.  Neither bidder wanted to bid more than that.  This was still $70K less than what we owe on the mortgage!  We are willing to do a short sale, but I don't think that the mortgage company will even take an offer that low.  This was very disappointing.  This home was listed for $199,900 (down from $209,000 originally) and I cannot believe that $103,000 is the fair market value for a 4bd, 2ba home in great condition.  I feel that we attracted buyers that thought this was a distressed home, but were not in our price range.
Bill, I feel that we followed your book, and it did not work for us.  Is it possible that the 5-day method does not work in a down market?

Tired and frustrated in MI,
Dawn