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Putting your home on the market is exciting. Then comes the waiting.
Are buyers looking at it online? Are they scheduling showings? What are they saying after they see it? And most importantly, are any of them willing to make an offer?
Sometimes a home gets plenty of attention right away. Other times, the response is quieter than we expected.
When that happens, it is easy to assume the answer is simply “more marketing.” Sometimes marketing does need to be adjusted. But if buyers can easily find the home online, the photos and presentation are strong, and the property is being exposed to the right audience, we also need to consider another possibility.
The market may be giving us information about the price.
Today’s Buyers Are Shopping the Payment, Not Just the Price
Mortgage rates affect much more than buyers.
When rates rise, the monthly payment on the same house rises with them. That means a buyer who could comfortably afford a certain price several months ago may not be comfortable at that same price today.
This is one reason buyer affordability has become such an important part of home pricing strategy.
Builders understand this very well. In August 2026, Realtor.com found that 18.8% of new-construction listings advertised some type of buyer incentive. Reduced mortgage rates were the most common, appearing on 13.8% of new-home listings.
Why are builders doing this?
They are trying to make the monthly payment work.
That matters to someone selling an existing home because buyers do not shop in a vacuum. They compare your home with other homes they could purchase, and in some areas that includes new construction offering rate incentives, closing-cost assistance, upgrades, or price reductions.
What Buyer Activity Can Tell Us
Once your home is on the market, I watch more than the number of online views.
We look at the progression:
Online views → Showings → Second looks → Offers
Each step tells us something.
If buyers are not finding the listing online, we may have an exposure problem.
If they are finding it online but not scheduling showings, we need to ask why they are eliminating it before ever walking through the door.
If buyers are touring the home but not making offers, that tells us something different.
And if we are receiving offers, even if they are not offers you want to accept, buyers are at least telling us that the home is within a range where they are willing to engage.
The goal is not to react emotionally to a slow week or immediately reduce the price because a house has not sold.
The goal is to recognize patterns.
A Price Adjustment Is a Strategy, Not a Punishment
Sellers sometimes hear “price reduction” as, “Your house isn’t worth what we thought.”
That is not necessarily what is happening.
The market changes. Interest rates change. Competing homes come on the market. Other sellers reduce their prices. Builders offer incentives. Buyers gain or lose purchasing power.
Our pricing strategy has to respond to the market that exists now.
In fact, builders are doing exactly that. In July 2026, 37% of builders surveyed by the National Association of Home Builders reported cutting prices, with an average reduction of 6%. At the same time, 63% were using some type of sales incentive.
They are not necessarily saying something is wrong with their homes. They are responding to what buyers can afford and what it takes to get them to act.
An individual home seller may need to do the same thing.
Price Isn’t the Only Tool We Have
A price adjustment is not always the first or only answer.
Depending on the property, competition, buyer feedback, and financing involved, our options might include:
- Adjusting the asking price
- Contributing toward allowable buyer closing costs
- Considering a mortgage rate buydown
- Addressing a condition issue buyers consistently mention
- Improving presentation or marketing
- Highlighting features that distinguish the home from competing properties
The important thing is that we make those decisions based on evidence.
If buyers consistently tell us something, either through their comments or simply through their actions, we should pay attention.
The Market Doesn’t Know What You Need From the Sale
This may be the hardest part of pricing a home.
The market does not know what you paid for your house.
It does not know how much you spent on improvements.
It does not know what you need to net for your next purchase.
And it does not know what a neighbor sold for two years ago.
Buyers are looking at the choices available to them today and asking, “Which one gives me the best combination of home, location, condition, features, and monthly payment?”
Our job is to position your home as competitively as possible within those choices.
That does not mean automatically chasing the market downward. It means watching the evidence and being willing to adapt when the evidence becomes clear.
What I Want My Sellers to Know
If your home is listed and we are not seeing the traffic or offers we expected, I am not going to simply tell you, “We need to lower the price.”
I want us to look at why.
What are buyers seeing online? What homes are they choosing instead? What has sold since we listed? Has new competition entered the market? Are buyers consistently mentioning the same concern? How does your monthly-payment picture compare with competing properties?
Then we can decide together whether the best response is patience, better positioning, a concession, a marketing adjustment, or a change in our pricing strategy.
Selling a home is not about guessing what buyers might do.
It is about watching what they actually do and responding wisely.
Have questions about what buyers are doing in your neighborhood or whether your current pricing strategy still makes sense? I’m happy to pull the local numbers and walk through them with you.
Visit rob-hurt.com to schedule a time to talk.
