RPC,

Sounds like the house is getting viewings which I would equate to your agent
doing their job (I don't know how slow 40 in 7 weeks is considered in your
area...but it sounds good to me). I'd be tempted to just hold on. If you
realize that a financial squeeze is not that far off I would put together a
spreadsheet and try to figure out;
1) what is this house costing me to keep each week?
2) is it depreciating because I am not around to keep it clean/from smelling
'unlived' in.
3) are my chances of selling getting better or worse.
If it all looks doom and gloom then I would consider dropping the price
further, I'm not sure that dropping the price ever 'hurts' the possibility
of a sale.

You are still asking a lot of money for you house (at least most people I
think would consider that a lot). 7 weeks IMHO is still not all that long.
If it were 6 months I would start to worry.

Don't worry too much about the lack of dates when you were younger, the
sense of humor makes up for the halitosis. ;-)

Regards Mark

"RPC" wrote in message
...
We bought a new house fully expecting to sell our current one. (Selling
was not a condition for buying, that would not have worked, and we have
enough money to hold both houses for a while if needed).

We put our house on the market (in a Chicago suburb with rather high
real-estate prices in recent years) at somewhat less than the top price
paid for similar houses in past months. Before listing it we got a new
tear-off roof, new CAC, patching and painting indoors, exterior paint
(previous year)...everything is in good shape, clean and neat, newish
appliances and mechanicals, neutral decor blah blah. We took anything we
didn't need to storage so the house would look spacious. (Admittedly it
is a small house, but so are the comparables.)

We have had a good number of showings (maybe 40 in seven weeks, not
including open house visitors). Several have come back a second time.
Some have asked about utility bills or other specific information. Our
agent reports 'beautiful house' comments at the open houses, which
attracted typically 10-15 groups of potential buyers each time.

We dropped the price $25K (6%) after 4 weeks. It has now been 7 weeks. We
have received NO offers at all, none. Our agent has solicited feedback
and received nothing useful from buyers' agents.

We can see, from MLS-derived listings in real-estate web pages, that
while some comparable houses in our area do remain unsold, most of those
that came on the market at the same time or later have sold. We went to
see some of these during their open houses, and they are (in our
prejudiced opinion) flawed in one way or another. But they have sold. So
the market, while not red-hot like last year, is not dead either.

We have a neighbor whose dogs bark loudly and frequently. Maybe that's
it. Maybe we have bad taste in our decor. Maybe the house smells and we
don't know it (like halitosis). Maybe we could fix up the garage some
more. We are going crazy wondering what else we could do to make the
house attractive; it reminds me of when I was young and couldn't get a
date.

But it can't be really bad, because people have shown interest, they just
never pull the trigger. One woman has come to the last three open houses,
looking and pondering. She brought her husband last Sunday. But no offer.

Our area has seen quite high prices in the last three years, so certainly
buyers can get a better deal in other localities. We are ready to lower
the price further, but our agent (believe it or not) is not convinced
that this is necessary or useful, she suggests we wait.

How does one end up in the Twilight Zone? How common is this? have others
experienced this? And how can we get out of this warp?

All advice (or soothing words) appreciated.