If you've been told homes won't sell in the active retirement communities during the summer, you were horribly mislead. Homes DO sell in the summer and because the inventories are down during those warm months, the homes that ARE on the market get quite a bit of traffic.
We have serious buyers that roll into town with the sole intention of purchasing their home for the next season. Some of them come to town with the belief they will get a better deal during the summer because "houses don't sell then in Arizona and the sellers must be desperate".
Guess what? Many of those buyers find themselves competing with other buyers for the same “deal”. As a result, I've found the prices tend to be a little more stable during the summer. Why is this? It’s pretty simple. It comes down to supply and demand.
If you have a home in great condition that is correctly priced, the chances are very good it will be under contract before fall rolls around. You might even have multiple offers to sort through. No joke! I’ve seen it happen in this market. I've also seen homes go under contract within days or weeks of hitting the market because the demand can exceed the supply of certain models.
Another, perhaps more important, reason not to wait to list your home is that in a declining market waiting will cost you money. While home sales in some of our communities have remained fairly strong, none of us can predict when the bottom will come. Waiting four or five months can cost you serious equity as the prices continue to go down. Then, about the time you want to list YOUR home, 20 other people with the same model do so as well.
Once again, it’s all about supply and demand. Personally, I would rather not have as much competition to sell my home. Just a thought…