Welcome back to Mike Ferry TV. My name is Tony Smith, filling in for Mike this week remotely. Okay, here we are. The first week of July 2025, six months of the year is behind us, and we have an incredible six months right here in front of us today. Are you planning to take full advantage of the six months in front of us? Today there’s the topic that we all need to address a little more often, and it is about pricing, property and price reductions. Mike for years has always said listings are the name of the game. Then he upped the ante and said listings are how you stay in the game. He was actually quoted saying listings are the game. And then recently he put out a note to all of us that said price reductions and pricing property is now the game. Right? So we all know the market has shifted a little bit, and we all can appreciate that pricing property correctly is the right thing to do today. If you want to keep your momentum going. Keep your listing selling. Keep producing income and profit for yourself. So let’s talk a little bit about pricing property today and price reductions. The first point I wrote down is for a little reminder. Any agent can list a property overpriced okay. The skill required to list a property overpriced. In fact, for a long, long time, all of us were able to get away a little bit with listing a property overpriced. You know, the seller would say, I want, I want 475 and you go, well, the comps are saying for 50, well, let’s go ahead and try for 75. And then guess what? For 75 would sell the house. Well we all know those days are somewhat over. Alright. So there’s a skill involved that we have to get back in tune with when it comes to pricing property.

1) We have to know the market

The first thing I wrote down was we have to know the market. All right. If we are going to be a student of price, we must be a student of the market statistics. Are you studying the number of homes that are for sale? Are you studying the homes that are actually selling each and every day? Are you studying the homes that are not selling and getting an understanding of what doesn’t work right? Do you know the days on the market? Do you know how many price reductions are happening in your market today? The more knowledge you have about the market conditions, the stronger you are when it comes to pricing property. Um, knowledge equals confidence and ignorance equals fear. We want you to have the utmost confidence of what it takes to price property right today. Study the market stats.

2) Our success when it comes to getting a listing sold begins with the price

The second thing I wrote down our success when it comes to getting a listing sold begins with the price. Of course. Okay. If you really think about it, there’s pretty much not anything that can be wrong with a house that couldn’t be overcome with price. It’s on a busy street. There’s a price that will cause it to sell, right? Um, the condition isn’t so great. There’s a price that will cause it to sell. The location is off. There’s a price that will cause it to sell. So we have to remember that the price of the property is the driving force of the transaction. At the same time, we have to keep in mind that we are not responsible for that price. Okay? You’re not responsible for the prices when they went up, and you’re not responsible for the prices if they stabilize or decline. We don’t accept responsibility for that. It’s not your price. It’s the market’s price. All right. Um, you might even consider including in your presentations. I am simply the messenger of price. Please don’t shoot the messenger.

3) What is your pricing strategy?

Okay, look at point three. What is your pricing strategy? All right. Like, I would recommend every month, every few weeks that you sit down for a second, and after you’ve studied the market and studied the comps and the stats, decide for yourself. What’s your pricing strategy for the upcoming month? Okay, there’s you know, it. Does it make a lot of sense to use three- and four-month-old sales comps right now? Those aren’t any good anymore, right? Um, 30-day old comps today is probably starting to push it. Uh, you may need to revert to being the number one priced property in terms of all the other homes that are for sale. Maybe you even need to start using pending comps as your approach to pricing property. You know, a comparable property that went under contract last week in a seller’s neighborhood is oftentimes one of the closest representations of price. So, what is your pricing strategy? Get clear on it. Do I need to be the number one active? Am I using shorter and closer comps? What are you using to select the price.

4) Set the seller’s expectations about price and price reductions

Okay. Uh, look at this for when it comes to pricing property. If you get to the end of the presentation and you haven’t gotten it priced perfectly, it’s very important to set the seller’s expectations about price and price reductions. All right. Um, oftentimes we’re asking you to put a price reduction form back in your prelisting package. It’s starting to introduce the expectation of reducing price. But consider this dialog. So Mr. Seller, now that we’ve listed the property with my marketing plan, there’s something that’s been proven, uh, over the years in real estate. If we generate a lot of showings on your properties and we get no offers, we are 5% overpriced. And on the other side, if with an aggressive marketing plan, we generate very little or no showings, your property is 10% overpriced. So, let’s keep a close look at the showings on your property over the next couple of weeks. Shall we? You can set the cellar up for adjustments of price. Set them up for the expectations.

5) Start rating your properties every month

Look at number five. Consider this strategy. When it comes to listings, there are several things. Start rating your properties every month. Take your listings and every month rate them the address of the property. What is the motivation of the seller on a scale of 1 to 10? How would you rate the condition of the property on a scale of 1 to 10? How about the location of the property? On a scale of 1 to 10? How about the show ability? Is it easy access to show? What’s the price you have at listed at? And what price do you feel would get it sold in the next seven days? So every month take your listings and rate each and every one of them and take a very close look at what you have in your inventory pipeline. We used to take this approach. Okay, so I’ve got six listings. I rated them all. We divide them into thirds. The top third, which are the listings that you just know are priced right and are going to sell. All right. We look at that then the middle range we’re not sure or the condition isn’t quite right for the price or something’s quite there. We need to work on that listing to get it sold. And then the bottom third, the ones that you know are not motivated. The condition is wrong. They’re not going to adjust their price and they’re just sitting there stagnant. Consider giving those lower end properties back. If they’re not going to sell, why should I keep them?

6) Use our plan of action

Okay. Look at this strategy. Use our plan of action. Okay. Mike Ferry created a plan of action that works. Okay. It’s that whole series of things that you’re going to do to get the house sold. Introduce that plan of action to your seller. Turn it into a checklist. Have the cellar go step by step down that plan of action and so you can follow along with them. It’s very important for sellers today to have a clear connection to what you’re doing to get their home sold. Right. You might include in your plan of action somewhere down in the middle. Um, reduce price if necessary. Okay. Because that is a common thing that they’re going to need to encounter in this process. The second thing you need to consider how about this cadence. Think about this cadence. We would call it the 21-day approach. All right. When you have a listing the first week you communicate with the seller all of the things you’re doing or are going to do to work to get their home sold. Right. You you share with them all the things you’re doing. I’m calling through the neighborhood. I presented your property to all the agents in the office. We’ve got it posted on all the websites. Right. Week one is go over what you’re going to do to sell it. Week two, you cover the results of those actions. How many showings? What was the response of those showings? Offers. Lack of offers. What’s going on in the neighborhood? Properties that have sold that you haven’t? What’s happened because of your results? And then week three reduce the price. So think about that cadence. Week one here’s what I’m doing. Week two here’s the results of what we’re doing. Week three. Adjust the price. Repeat. Okay. That cadence works like a charm.

How about this? Um. Create for yourself a little post price reduction checklist. All right, so when you list a property and then it’s not selling, you present to the seller and adjusted price. They adjust the price. What steps do you take after that price reduction to get the home sold. If you need to spell those out you know, I changed the, the um, price in the MLS. I rewrite the the comments in the MLS. I changed the photos of the house and the MLS a little bit. I contact everybody that’s shown the property so far. I represent the new price to the neighborhood. I represent the new price to all the agents in my office. What are the steps you take after a price reduction? You might want to give that checklist to your seller, so they know what you’re doing after you get a price dropped. Okay. Um. Skills. For most of us, we haven’t had to be that aggressive with our skills for a long time. When it comes to the prequalification of the seller, motivation is critical today. The pricing portion of your presentation. Boy, do we have to get it priced right to start. And then naturally, all of the scripts and dialogs that we have for price reductions. So, we should spend a lot more time working on those three skills. Have you set up good, solid role plays on the initial pricing, on prequel, on price reductions. Get your role play partners involved, and let’s spend a lot more time honing our skills when it comes to pricing property today.

7) Refer to the seller’s motivation throughout the entire process

All right. And then I wrote number seven on my list is refer to the seller’s motivation throughout the entire process. Okay. Our job is to connect that seller to the motivation that they have. Why are they going. We need to connect that seller to that and the process of getting their home sold. When it comes to price. Bring up their motivation often. Okay.

8) If it takes a little more work to find the right motivation of a seller, we have to commit and accept to that work.

And then the last point I wrote down for today is we have to remember something. If the market is demanding a little more motivated seller, and the market is demanding that the price must be right if it’s going to sell. We have to talk to enough people to find those motivated people. All right. If if it takes a little more work to find the right motivation of a seller, we have to commit and accept to that work. Have you increased your prospecting? Have you increased your lead follow up? Are you spending more time talking to more people to find those motivated people in your marketplace? Listen, there are plenty of highly motivated people in your market. Your job is to go out there every single day and find those people, right? It is not that complicated. It might require a little more work on your part. Prospecting. Alright. So, listen. Six months are in front of us. We’ve got our superstar retreat coming up this month. It is going to be off the charts. I believe one of the best retreats we have ever had. The lineup is spectacular. Mike’s on fire. We’re ready to go. If you’re not registered for our retreat, go to Mike Ferry dot com and get registered immediately. The clock is ticking. Thanks for your time.