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Listing Your Home? You Call The Shots

Q. In a few months, we plan to put our home on the market. We've already talked with two real estate agents about listing the house for sale. They both said their companies insist on six-month listings.

This seems like a very long time. Is a six-month listing customary?

A. No. You can list your home for sale for whatever term you wish. Some agents will accept a listing for as short as 30 days. Those agents obviously have great confidence in their sales ability.

Other agents will take a 60-day listing. But such a listing is only for agents willing to work hard.

However, most agents want at least a 90-day listing so they have the opportunity to expose your home to the marketplace for a reasonable period of time.

But the agents who lack confidence in their ability to sell your home will ask for a longer listing, such as 120 or even 180 days. These agents are betting a buyer will come along during the 180 days. That might happen, but probably not due to the ability of your sales agent.

As a former real estate salesman who retired to the best job in the world (writing this newspaper column), I know from experience that most real estate agents work hardest, smartest and fastest just before their listing is about to expire.

Also, there are a few lazy realty agents who take listings, put them in the local multiple listing service, never spend time or money marketing the listing, then hope some other MLS agent will sell the house.

For your protection, never list your home for more than 90 days. If the listing expires with the home unsold but the agent is doing a good job, you can always renew the listing.

But if you chose a lazy agent, after the listing expires in 90 days, then you can list your home with a better agent.

Q. I own a vacant commercial-zoned property adjoining a busy highway. When I bought this land about 15 years ago, I thought it would be a good investment. But this highway never developed very well and it has lots of cheap little businesses. It is a very busy four-lane highway but with no major commercial businesses.

Now the city is proposing to re-zone my land and others adjoining for apartments. I'm undecided if this is good or bad. What's your opinion?

A. The situation you describe is called down-zoning. Normally, reducing a property's zoning from commercial to apartment residential would result in a reduction of market value.

However, since your vacant land wasn't attracting commercial uses, perhaps it will do better as apartment-zoned land. Maybe you or a developer will now want to build apartments on the land. I don't see any harm in not protesting the down-zoning.

Q. I'm a new landlord. What's the best way of checking out a prospective tenant-applicant's background? I ran a credit check on an applicant but it had several "late pays."

I phoned her current landlord, who gave her a glowing recommendation. But I think he wants to get rid of her. She says she lived with her parents previously. Any ideas?

A. This situation sounds like trouble. Bad credit shows the applicant does not place high priority on paying her obligations on time.

The current landlord may be eager to get rid of her. Without one or two positive references, I would be very doubtful. Keep looking for a better-qualified tenant.

Q. My ex-wife and I are divorced. We agreed to put our house on the market. She is living in the house and is not very cooperative with the real estate agents.

The listing agent found a buyer and I accepted the offer. But my ex-spouse refuses to sign the deed. What can I do to force her to sell?

A. Please consult the attorney who represented you in the divorce. If the home sale was not part of the divorce decree, you may need to sue your ex-wife in a partition lawsuit to force the sale of the house.

This legal remedy is available to any co-owner who wants to sell, but the other owner refuses.

(Copyright, 1993, Universal Press Syndicate)

Bob Bruss' column appears Sundays in the Home/Real Estate section. His mailing address is: Bob Bruss, Seattle Times Newsroom, P.O. Box 70, Seattle, WA 98111.