Is there truly a "Home Selling Season" anymore?

Seasons come and seasons go. The cycle never seems to change. Industry experts point to trending numbers in sales of existing homes on a quarterly calendar basis. These numbers usually reflect an uptick in sales in the spring and summer and a downward trend towards the late fall and winter. This year however, showed surprising strength in sales in February and March. Contrary to what has been ingrained in out thought patterns for home sales. This cyclical trend has been diminishing steadily since the advent of the Internet and Real Estate sites like Trulia, Zilliow and Realtor.com.

    In the old day's before computers, the listings were printed out, placed in binders and delivered to the local real estate offices. This was done on a regular basis and according to schedule. This schedule in turn created a cyclical market based on the distribution of these binders. Financially it did not make sense to print the listing out every week, so they settled on either monthly or quarterly or even seasonally. 

    As the industry matured and adapted marketing to the new technologies, the cyclical nature of residential real estate has been steadily declining. With the new global economy and the proliferation of computers around the globe, marketing real estate became 24/7, 365. Listings are syndicated worldwide within hours. This synergistic integration of Internet marketing into the traditional marketing model has truly made selling your home as easy as having someone in say China view your home on-line and then jump on a plane and make the purchase. 

    No you say? Well that is happening all the time in my market area. The Internet is the main driver of home sales in the United States. 100% of people looking for a home begin their search on-line. Newspapers are shuttering their printing plant doors and moving their entire operation onto the Internet. When is the last time you saw a 20 something reading a newspaper? They may however subscribe to an on-line edition of that newspaper that your parents used to read. 

    That is why in today's market it is important to choose a Realtor who has extensive knowledge of how the Internet works to sell your home. It is not just simply putting the property on the local Multiple Listing Service and waiting for another Realtor to sell it. It about your Realtor getting out there on the Internet and selling the listing for you!