If you have decided to sell your home and you believe that real estate prices will be declining for many houses, coops and condos in several areas of metro NY including Westchester County, then you should consider certain steps that may apply to your circumstances.   Last month's column covered the first two steps.  
The first step is to get more involved in the sales process, even if you are using a real estate agent. In this environment, you should be using email to send information (e.g. a website home page) to hundreds of prospects, making the message as viral as possible.   The second step is to prepare yourself emotionally for disappointments that are more frequent in a difficult market.  

The third step is to put more effort and money into preparing your home for sale.   Buyers see many homes before they buy.   In the upcoming downturn, buyers will be even more selective and the number of homes available for sale will be even greater.   To compete effectively, you need to differentiate your home, while enhancing the value, as much as possible.   Some changes are expensive like fixing the roof, repairing the windows, pointing up the foundation, and painting the inside and out.   But other changes are not costly, like tidying up the outside, trimming shrubs and hedges, pruning trees, and adding colorful flowers, rock gardens.   Don't make your home too unique from a decoration standpoint as it may conflict with the tastes of most buyers.   Declutter it of newspapers, and mementos.   Remove the mess of ornate items and collectibles. Show the hard wood floors.   Go for a lived-in but a clean fen shui look.   One that relaxes rather than causes jitters.   Consider the services of a stager or decorator.   The cost may come back to you many fold.

As prices decline, the fourth step to consider is to create a "portfolio" of your home to help the selling process, for both a hard copy version to always have it available and a website version.  When developing the portfolio, you should collect photos and videos and assemble the portfolio to be informative and appealing.   Besides the usual aspects, highlight the special features.   Examples include the backyard privacy, the spacious home office, the high ceilings giving an open airy feeling, the large windows letting in lots of light, the easy-to-clean kitchen counters, the large maintenance-free stone patio, the slope of land allowing for the runoff of water and lack of flooding, the expandability of the attic and basement, and on and on.   You may have photos or videos from many years ago, or during the different seasons, which can help educate the buyer. Although many real estate websites contain community info, often it is in the form of cold facts and figures.   Personalize the community info.   Clip articles from newspapers and magazines, with photos, about the positive developments in the community, especially helpful to buyers from outside the area.   Stress the locale and proximity to highways, shopping, and services.    Consider taking videos of the key points of interest, like beaches and lakes, parks, churches, downtown shopping, schools and their principals and community. An example is on www.VideoVoom.com.   Video is effective because it includes audio and the ability to make your points in your own voice, honestly and clearly.   Try to capture what it is like to live in your home, not just in the rooms, but also in the community.              

About the author

Frank Sisco is a CPA and Personal Financial Specialist, and author of several articles about personal finance and issues of life and money.   His firm, Financial Management Corporation, is located in New Rochelle, NY, where he resides with his wife and daughter..  He can be reached at his home office at 914.740.4422 or by email at ideasmoney@aol.com, or visit his website at www.LifeAndMoney.com which contains this article and prior ones.