On top of an overall plunge in prices, homes in Tucson usually sell for less than what their owners are hoping to get for them.
If a family has an emotional attachment to a home, it's even less likely to sell for what the owner thinks it's worth, says Stephanie Friend, a local agent with ZipRealty Inc.
That's often the case for those selling homes in central and northeast Tucson. Homes there tend to sell for about 92 percent of the asking price, data from ZipRealty shows. ZipRealty uses statistics from local Multiple Listing Services to compare the asking price and selling price of homes in certain zip codes.
Homes on Tucson's south side are selling closest to their asking price, ZipRealty says.
In parts of town with higher foreclosure rates, homes are more likely to be owned by the bank and priced to move, Friend says. In older, more established communities in midtown and in the Catalina Foothills, sellers expect to get more cash from their homes.
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"The sellers there anticipate a higher return on their home," Friend says. "They're more owner-occupied and they have more of an attachment to the house."
Tucson wasn't the coolest market tracked by ZipRealty, which collects data from communities nationwide. Houses in North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Florida sold for less than 85 percent of the asking price.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, homes in Chicago, Oakland, Calif., and San Francisco sold for more than 105 percent of the asking price.
It's important, says Kevin Kaplan, vice president of marketing and technology for Long Realty, to get the price point for a house right at the beginning of the sales process. Sometimes sellers have only one shot to garner interest in their property. If the price is too high, buyers and their agents may pass it by.
Dropping the price of a home to get it closer to market values takes leverage away from the seller when it comes time to start haggling, he says. Buyers view that as an opportunity to push the price even lower.
"If they've seen a lot of price reductions on a house, they may think they have a lot of negotiating room," Kaplan says.
When listing a home, it's important to keep track of what other properties are selling for, rather than what others are listed for, Friend says. Putting too high a price tag on a home means it's going to take longer to sell.
On average, homes in Tucson stay on the market more than 90 days, Friend says. That's up considerably from four or five years ago when offers started rolling in right away.
At that time, homes were selling in less than a month, Friend says. In a healthy market homes should be selling in a little more than two months, she says.
When it comes to moving homes in the current conditions, Kaplan agrees a properly priced home is going to spend less time on the market. If a home is priced too high, and the seller has to start lowering that price, it only gives buyers an extra incentive to wait and see if the price will drop even further.
And that means a house could spend even more time sitting on the market.
How homes are selling
Where homes sell closest to the asking price
Zip Percent of code asking price
85756 (south side) 99.5
85757 (southwest side) 98.3
85747 (southeast side) 97.2
85641 (Vail) 97.2
85629 (Sahuarita) 97.2
Where homes sell less than the asking price
Zip Percent of code asking price
85705 (north side) 90.8
85749 (northeast side) 92.2
85718 (Catalina Foothills) 92.5
85716 (midtown) 93
85614 (Green Valley) 93.1
SOURCE: ZipRealty Inc.
Contact reporter Dale Quinn at dquinn@azstarnet.com or 573-4197.