A reader suggests that the Pecora’s new construction on Cognewaugh, now priced at just $3.150 million, should attract a buyer and of course he’d be right if this were last year. But what’s the right price today? I think everyone: buyers, sellers, agents and even appraisers is at sea right now. I toured a house today that was on a great street, very desirable once and probably still today. The house itself was, to my eye (viewing it as my current brace of buyers might) a bit cramped and too spread out. I thought it was overpriced by a million – the selling agent suggested that at its price, “it would never have lasted last year.” I think she’s wrong; I think she would never have reached this price in even the strongest market but the real point is that I don’t think she or her clients have accepted today’s reality. She sounded resentful that it hasn’t sold and if she is, her clients probably are too.
If they ever existed, the days of pricing in the stratosphere and being confident that, if the address were right, someone would pay it, are gone. When sellers finally realize that, we’ll start seeing movement in our inventory. Until then, we won’t.
For What It's Worth 
Cognewaugh could easily support this price, especially given the school district. Whether people trust Pecora is another matter, if they can still make a profit at the new list price, then it speaks very poorly of them to have listed it so high previously. People like that are known as loan-sharks or fraudsters. Whatever happened to building a house and selling it for a fair profit, what’s with all this price-gouging?
And builders wonder why they can’t unload their specs houses??? Maybe it is because buyers are tired of getting screwed by builders like Pecora. I am just saying, what goes around comes around……..
Well, I’ve got no problem with charging what the market will bear. If I were trying to sell my own house, and I’m glad I’m not, in this market, I’d price it at where I thought the market was – I wouldn’t tell a buyer, “oh no, my grandmother only paid $17,000 for this in 1957 so I couldn’t possibly charge you more than X.”
But you’re right – sellers, especially builders, can look pretty silly when they knock $5 million off their house – “you were going to gouge me that much!?”
Just curious what you mean by cramped and too spread out for the same house?