True facts in the age of fake news

It is always fun and a little disconcerting when I learn something that I thought was true is not true. Call it conventional wisdom or historical thinking. I don’t know but it happens all the time. And I welcome it. Whenever I go to Reddit’s “today I learned” or Snopes’ fact checking website there is often a “Wow, I didn’t know that” moment followed sometimes with a “I thought is was like this” moment.

Those are the best!

But when it comes to real estate true facts that are not true this is serious business. Maybe something happened once to a sister or a co-worker, maybe twenty years ago which was a different time, maybe interest rates were at 15%, maybe this, maybe that…everyone seems to have an anecdote about real estate that they hold dear.

And we tend to read the news and hear only what we want to hear. It’s called confirmation bias.

So when it comes believing to true facts you have to ask yourself is it:

Conventional wisdom
Historical thinking
Anecdotal evidence
Confirmation bias
Wishful thinking

If it is, then maybe that true fact you believe may not be true.

Here are some…

True facts about real estate that are not true

1. It’s a Seller’s Market so I can price as high as I want

2. It’s a Buyer’s Market so I can low-Ball

3. It’s a Seller’s Market, I don’t have to stage my home

4. My home is worth more than the comparable because…

5. My agent isn’t doing anything to sell my house

6. The other agent said my house is worth…

7. This Realtor has a pool of “ready buyers” for my house

8. Marketing will sell my home

9. Remax is the biggest and the best

10. I have to put down 20%

11. I don’t need a Buyer’s Agent. I will save that commission money by working with the Listing Realtor

12. The market is horrible. I read it in the news

13. I don’t need an agent because I’m buying from a builder

14. I don’t need an agent. I can sell it myself

15. I can invest in a turn-key investment property for worry free passive income

16. Open houses sell houses

17. Real estate teams will do more for me than a single real estate agent

18. I can negotiate all of the flaws found in the home inspection

19. Everyone wants to live in Laurelwood, Uptown, near the LRT…

20. The best month to buy a home is January

21. House prices rise in the springtime

22. I won’t replace my roof because the buyer might want to put on a steel roof

23. The biggest and best Realtors plaster their faces all over everything.

24. I have time

25. Prices will go down

More true facts

Those are my top of mind “facts” as I sit down to write this. I could probably brainstorm 25 more, but you get the idea. Sometimes we believe what we want to believe. Sometime we read or hear something the confirms what we think. Sometimes we are convinced by a sales pitch or some slick marketing. Sometime what we believe used to be true but isn’t anymore.