Sales Advice - Spanish Homeowners

Setting the Sale Price

The most important part of your entire sales strategy when selling your Spanish property is the asking price you place upon it.

Ask too much and you will find that people don't even bother viewing your property let alone make you an offer. On the other hand if you ask a price which is too low, then you will find lots of people coming to your door, all trying to part you from your assets for a bargain price. Setting the correct asking price is the result of thorough market research and is essential if you really want to sell your property quickly whilst at the same time receiving the maximum return.

To save yourself from having to study the local property market and try to establish the best asking price for your property in Spain yourself, you could opt to have it professionally valued. An evaluation can be carried out by a local estate agent or a specialist valuation company, usually for a fee, although this is normally money well spent if they set the price correctly and you sell quickly.

To establish the valuation of your Spanish property yourself you will need to:

• check the current asking prices of comparable properties in the area

• find out the sales prices of comparable properties in the area

• work out the difference between these asking prices and selling prices

• identify your property's USP (unique selling point) and ask yourself, "Could I justify a higher price because of it?"

• remember - a property is only worth what someone is prepared to pay for it

If, after studying the market, having an evaluation done and identified your USP you still believe your property is worth more, you can always market it at a higher sale price and hope the property market will 'catch up' with your expectations. This is a risky strategy and you must be prepared to sit it out for the long wait as 'higher than market' values will attract a lot less interest from potential buyers and agents and therefore fewer viewings as a result.

A word of caution: some agents (although this is not restricted to Spain) will overprice your property and tell you exactly what you want to hear with the sole intention of getting you to list with them, only to gradually let you down over a period of time and persuade you to lower your price to 'get the viewings in'. In some parts of Spain this has led to too many overpriced properties flooding the market.

In the current economic climate you cannot be greedy. The harsh truth is that there are many, many people who have properties in Spain to sell and who are now prepared to break even or possibly sell at a loss. In such a buyers market, they will be picky over their choice of property and if you decide not to rent out yours for either the short or long term, then you need to be realistic in your pricing.

Final thoughts

Serious sellers set a realistic asking price and again, ANY property is only worth what someone else is prepared to pay for it.

Good luck!