The Austin market is intense right now, very challenging & competitive for buyers with extremely low inventory. If you are in Austin and have even remotely thought of selling, we should talk as you may be surprised what you could get for your house.
So with this $894,500 listing in Lost Creek that I just posted live yesterday, at 7am Sunday, I spent all day Sunday from 7am to 10pm fielding texts & calls & helping manage the online scheduling of 52 showings and doing my best to keep agents informed, adjusting comments in the MLS throughout the day. Within 4 hours of being on the market, we had 48 showings scheduled and I had to turn off the scheduling as there were no more slots available (and a few unhappy people). Worthy of note, because some folks were like why didn't you just do an open house ... one word: COVID. Oh, and get this ... it snowed in Austin yesterday! It was so beautiful, heavy wet beautiful snow that only happens here every few years AND the electricity in the entire Lost Creek neighborhood was out all afternoon! I actually had a couple agents doing tours with flashlights (it came back on about 530pm) ... I told the flashlight agents they get the go-with-the-flow award for the day.
Just yesterday, my seller commented on my process and said "Oh, you're pretty much a project manager." Yes, that is exactly it. And a fiduciary, a negotiator, a marketer, a counselor.
As I type this and a bit of a side note, I am watching an Austin economic update zoom ... I watch this sort of report all the time but especially in this market as we are all trying our best to understand the dynamics, navigate it as best we can, and attempt to communicate an educated response to our friends and clients. Cliff notes version: extreme inventory shortage & CA moves to Austin.
Some things I have learned with this listing:
- we are all trying to figure out how to best navigate this market in real time
- the early bird ... it's helpful in this market
- the online scheduler was a godsend
- I can shower & dress in 5 minutes
- far too many Realtors do not read the MLS detail
- some Realtors do not know how to put together a complete offer (& it's not my job to educate them, unless they are my mentee)
- Realtors are pretty cool about using text as a quick & effective way to communicate
- you have to have a couple agents on-call to handle/refer unrepresented buyers
- spousal support helps a lot
- if you have a new listing, you better completely clear your schedule for a few days
- snow always makes me happy
Here's a video tour ...