How to Sell Your Jacksonville Home in a Buyer’s Market

 

The Jacksonville market has changed, and if you’ve been following along, you already know it’s shifted pretty dramatically from where we were in 2022 and 2023. Sellers had all the leverage back then, and that has swung significantly toward buyers. But if you’re in a situation where you need to sell in this market, three things need to happen.

Price for today’s market, not yesterday’s. This is the single most important factor for sellers right now. A lot of people go to list their home and say, “Well, two years ago, John down the street sold his for $785,000.” That may be true, but that was a different market with different interest rates, different buying power, and different buyer sentiment. What matters now is what homes in your neighborhood are selling for today.

We look at the price per square foot of every home that’s sold in your neighborhood and a couple of surrounding neighborhoods to build a detailed picture of where things actually stand. The only data that matters to me is what’s happened in the last six months, and if something sold last month, that carries more weight than anything from six months ago.

Here’s the part that sellers don’t always want to hear. As a listing agent, my job isn’t to say yes to everything you want. If you call another agent and they tell you they can get your price when they realistically can’t, that agent is doing you a disservice. I had a situation recently where another agent sent me three comps to justify their pricing. One hadn’t even sold, another was on a 1.3-acre lot compared to our 0.25-acre lot, and the third was completely updated when ours wasn’t. None of those were real comparables. The last agent you want to hire is the one who just tells you what you want to hear. You want someone who understands the market, breaks down price per square footage, and knows what a real comparable sale looks like.

Make your home presentable. This isn’t groundbreaking advice, but it matters more in a buyer market because buyers have options. If your home needs new flooring, paint, sod, or minor repairs, those things need to be done before you list. Do I think staging is necessary on every single home? No. I think staging matters in the higher end of real estate, but for most homes, decluttering, touch-up paint, minor repairs, updated lighting fixtures, and high-quality photography and videography will do more for you than anything else.

I see agents all the time selling homes in the $400,000 to $1 million range with iPhone photos, which is outlandish. You’re paying an agent $14,000 in commission, and they can’t spend $600 or $700 on professional photography? In a digital world where the first thing a buyer sees is the pictures, you need those pictures to pop. We use professional photographers, drone footage, and video on every listing. It’s one of the easiest ways to set your home apart in this market.

Be flexible and willing to negotiate. I use this analogy about fish in a pond. In 2022 and 2023, there were 15 or 20 fish in every pond trying to eat the same hook. Right now, there might be two. If you get an offer, you need to seriously consider making it work. More often than not, the first offer you get in any market, and especially this one, is going to be your best one. You’re not just negotiating on price, either. It might be timing, closing costs, a home warranty, or a rate buydown that helps the buyer get comfortable enough to move forward.

A lot of sellers are struggling with this right now because over the last five, six, seven years, they haven’t had to negotiate. When they bought their home, they didn’t get to negotiate either. So now they’re reluctant to do it on the sell side. The reality is that not everybody wins in the real estate game. Timing is something you can’t always control, and many people who bought in 2022 and 2023 are finding out their homes may not be worth what they paid. That’s a tough pill to swallow, but the quicker you understand the reality of your situation, the better off you’ll be in this market.

If you’re thinking about selling and you want honest answers about what you can actually do in this market, not somebody who’s just going to tell you what you want to hear, reach out. Call or text me at 904-650-3890 or email me at matty@pursuitrealestate.com. You can also find out what your Jacksonville home is worth or visit mattymillerrealestate.com for more. I’m here to give you the real picture.