Selling a home in North NJ

For sellers

Your house is a product with one first impression.

I spent more than twenty years in fashion merchandising, most recently as a Vice President of Merchandising. I know how to take something and present it so that people want it, and so that they pay what it is worth.

That is what you are hiring me to do. Not to put a sign in the yard — to run a launch.

The process

1. We start with the comps, honestly

Before we talk about paint colors, we talk about numbers. I will show you what has actually sold, what is sitting, and what the data says your home is worth. If that number is lower than you hoped, I will tell you that first, with the evidence.

This is the conversation that matters most, and it is the one most agents avoid because it is uncomfortable. I would rather have it in March than in September.

2. We decide what to fix and what to leave

Not every improvement earns its cost back. I will walk your house with you and tell you which changes will move your sale price and which are money you will not recover. That includes telling you when the answer is "leave it" — which happens more often than you would expect.

3. We prepare and stage

Merchandising is the discipline of making a product read correctly to the person standing in front of it. Staging is that discipline applied to a house: editing, lighting, flow, and removing everything that distracts from what you are actually selling.

I will tell you what to do and help you get it done, including connecting you with vendors I trust.

4. We price it as a marketing decision

Price is not a number you arrive at and then work around. It is the most powerful marketing lever you have. The first two weeks on the market are when your home gets the most attention it will ever get, and we plan for those two weeks before the listing goes live.

5. We launch

Professional photography, the right timing, and the Sotheby's network behind it. I market your home to the buyers most likely to want it, not just to whoever happens to be browsing.

6. We negotiate, and we get to closing

The offer is the middle of the process, not the end. Inspection, appraisal, financing and attorney review are where deals are won and lost, and I stay on all of it.

What I ask of you

• Be willing to hear the data. If you already know what your home must sell for regardless of what the comps say, we will both be frustrated.
• Be ready to do some work. Usually less than you fear, but rarely nothing.
• Tell me your real timeline. It changes the strategy completely, and I would rather plan around the truth.

What it costs

My compensation is discussed openly and agreed in writing before we list. In New Jersey commissions are negotiable. I will walk you through exactly what is included and what is not, with no surprises at closing.