The FrontSteps a San Francisco Real Estate Blog reports the ABC Nightline may do a story on the the practice of some seller agents taking a listing that has not sold off the market and then putting the property back on the market so it shows like it is a new listing.
Many believe this practice is unfair to the buying public.
This issue seems to surface every few months.
In my mind, it is not as big an issue as many think.
If a potential buyer is working with a knowledgeable professional agent who knows the local market, that agent will know whether the property was on the market 1 month ago or 3 months ago or 6 months ago.
When I represent buyers interested in purchasing a house in a particular neighborhood, I make sure I send them ALL the market data for similar properties in that neighborhood typically back at least 6 months but often 12 months. I send them active listings, pending listings, sold properties and expired or withdrawn listings. So my buyer clients have the information they need to make an informed decision. So in my mind if seller agents want to play games with days on market, let them. These games will not fool knowledgeable buyers working with experienced professional agents. That being said, many mls services like REInfolink on the San Francisco Peninsula now have CDOM and DOM - cumulative days on market and days on market - so the data is readily available.
Julie Joyce a realtor in the Montclair Piedmont area has similar thoughts stating that buyers in the Bay Area are sophisticated knowledgeable consumers who throughly research market data before making a decision.
Marian Bennett a realtor in the Half Moon Bay area on the San Mateo Coastside gives several specific examples on how days on market can vary and what days on market really means.
2 responses so far ↓
1 Eric Hundin // Jan 31, 2008 at 6:16 pm
I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you.
Eric Hundin
2 value of days-on-market statistic in real estate research | Coastal Real Estate and Lifestyles // Feb 3, 2008 at 8:45 pm
[…] Coldwell Banker colleagues and fellow bloggers Julie Joyce, CB Oakland/Piedmont office, and Arn Cenedella, CB Menlo Park El Camino office share their views on this subject […]
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