Each year, in our area, many home sellers make the same mistakes over and over again. When you add up these mistakes, they total more than a million dollars each year!

It pains us to watch these same common mistakes made over and over again, so we finally decided to do something about it. We've compiled this Special Report outlining the nine most common (and most expensive) mistakes made by home sellers each year.

People buy homes on emotion, not logic. Buying a home is always an emotional decision. People like to get a feel for a house to see if it is comfortable for them. It's difficult for them to get comfortable in a home if you follow them around, telling them all of the things that you've done to the house and pointing out every improvement that you've made. It may even have the opposite effect that you want to accomplish by making the prospective buyer feel that they are intruding into your private space.

Resist the temptation to talk to the buyer the entire time that they are in your home. Let them discover the home on their own.

If you're selling your home yourself, you'll always get more activity than if your home is listed with a real estate broker. If you open your front door to everyone who walks down the street and sees your sign, you may be spinning your wheels. We recommend that you ask buyers a few questions first to make sure they are qualified before wasting a lot of time with them.

A qualified buyer is one who is ready, willing and able to purchase your home if it fits his needs. Over the years, we've found that many people who look at For Sale By Owners are curiosity seekers, nosey neighbors, and people with poor credit hoping to get you to help them with the financing.

Other buyers may be qualified, but they're six months to two years away from being ready. They don't want to bother a real estate agent yet, so they call and look at For Sale By Owner homes to get a feel for what's available. Many of these folks have a home to sell first, or they need to save money for the down payment, or they may need to work on their credit rating. When everything else is finally in place, that's when they seriously begin their search for homes working with a real estate agent.

At Hoffman Realty, we "screen" buyers to make sure they are qualified before showing them homes. We don't show a buyer a home unless we know he can afford the house, how much he has to put down, how good his credit is, how much he can pay each month, and how much money he will realistically walk away with when he sells his present home. Those are just a few of the questions you should ask prospects before you show them your home. Ask questions before you waste a lot of time working with a buyer who may be unqualified or just looking for decorating ideas.

As a seller, you want to sell your home for the most money possible. Putting too high of a price on your home will often get you less money than you could have realized by putting a fair market value price on your home.

Keep this statistic in mind: On the average, buyers are comparing your home to fifteen to twenty other homes. If your house is not priced competitively, people looking at your home may reject your home in favor of superior homes priced very comparably.