Open House Showings: Should you be home?

Most agents will agree that having the seller present during showings is a significant disadvantage.

Visitors won’t linger as long and take as many mental notes because they feel uncomfortable either being watched or heard. Buyers are looking at your home initially as a product and are weighing its features to see if they match their needs. Your family memories are not simply relevant to a potential buyer.

If you absolutely must be at home while potential buyers are there, try to stay busy and out of the way. Most of all, do not follow them through the home pointing out your remodeling projects.

As a seller, probably the most helpful thing you can do to facilitate showings is to allow your agent to place a lock box on your home so that agents working with buyers are free to tour your home after making an appointment during a time that is convenient for their buyers.

If an agent finds 7 homes to show in an afternoon and yours is the 8th home they would like to include but you have to be there to let them in and “can they make you last on the list to give you time to clean up”…

...the agent may run out of steam and cancel the showing on your home because of time constraints, or because they feel that it is just too much trouble to show.

Open houses are meant to gain exposure for your home while it is being presented to the market. As long as your expectations are in line with what is most likely to happen, you may find that allowing an open house at your home is advantageous.