Market Timing: When is the Best Time to List Your House?

Should you put your market on the house before the spring rush? Or, is waiting until you have more buyers and interest the best time to list your home for sale? Questions like these look for the best strategies when it comes to real estate market timing. When ultimately is the best time to list your home and get the largest possible profit?

Does History Predict the Future?

Looking back on the real estate trends last year can be beneficial for future forecasting. Based on examining data from the previous year, we get a general idea of whether or not the market will quickly pick up in the coming months.

Currently in Santa Clara county, we have a 1:1 ratio of homes for sale and homes that are selling. This is a great number if you are selling your home. We were at a similar rate at this time last year.  By April of 2010, the inventory of homes on the market actually increased by 50%. However, the sales of homes only increased by 25%.

What does this trend from last year mean? When the ratio of homes for sale and homes sold each moth was equal, this was great for a seller! But once spring rolls around and inventory increased, there was greater competition among sellers. Home buyers were at the advantage and buyers were at a slight disadvantage, compared to just a couple of months before.

So Is Today the Best Time to Sell?

The new year just “sprung” and you may be wondering what all this data has to do with your home. If you plan to sell in the next few months, and if last year is any predictor, today is the best time to put your house on the market.

Why? There are fewer homes on the market right now and this gives your home a distinct advantage. It also gives you a much greater probability of selling your home and doing so quickly. Provided interest rates don’t take a nose dive or dramatically skyrocket, right now is a great time to put your home on the market. In fact, today is better than putting it on the market during the upcoming spring rush.

“When is the best time to sell?” is the million dollar question in the real estate market today. If you study the trends of last year and see what our current trends are, they show that today is the best time to sell your home. You should sell it quicker and yield a higher profit in the end. This is great news for home sellers today!