New Hampshire, Maine Homeowners Struggle to Sell Homes

The slowing Maine housing market is creating a dilemma for people who want to buy houses at low prices but are having trouble selling their own homes.

Looking to downsize, Cindy Benjamin of Maine bought a three-bedroom Cape last spring for $255,000, or $14,000 less than the asking price. Seven months later, she still can’t sell her four-bedroom colonial, despite lowering the asking price significantly from $425,000 to $378,900.

Area real estate agents say the situation isn’t uncommon.

While this is a good time to buy a house, it’s also a challenging time to sell one.

“I bought at the right time, but I’m trying to sell at the wrong time,” Benjamin told the Concord Monitor.

Sales and prices have been falling in New England and nationwide. Housing prices fell in September by nearly 10 percent across the U.S. compared to the previous year, the biggest decline in 35 years. Massachusetts home loan demand has fallen the most drastically, having boomed so much in the 2000-2005 time period.

• The median price drop in Maine over the past 12 months was just over 1 percent, but the number of houses sold in the state in September plunged nearly 19 percent.
• Many homeowners are finding out the hard way that in order to buy a new house, they need to sell their old homes first — and that’s a catch-22 when buyers won’t bite.

With many analysts predicting no end in sight to the market slump, some people need a reality check, says Cathy Manchester at Keller Williams Realty in Gray, Me.

Start with price, by reviewing the current inventory of homes on the market, how many are in your price range and how long they’re taking to sell, on average.

“You have to know what you’re up against for competition,” Manchester said.

Unless they can handle two home mortgage loans for a while, people need to unload their current home before they can afford to put a new house under contract.

When the real estate market was hot, sellers might agree to a contingency sale in the contract, making the purchase contingent on the buyer selling their house in a set amount of time. But with sales slow and plenty of inventory, that practice has fallen out of favor.

“Sellers now realize that’s a waste of time,” said Leonard Scott, owner of Assist-2-Sell in Falmouth, Me.

In today’s market, he said, a good strategy for people who can handle the hassle is to sell their home and find short-term rental housing. That will give them time to locate the right real estate at the best value, and there should be plenty of options to choose from this winter.