How a friendship that started with our kids turned a vacant Lone Mountain home that had sat for six months into a sale, two homes back into one, and a bigger lot into the beginnings of the backyard they’d been dreaming about.
Where it started
An expired listing and an empty house
These sellers and I met through our kids, who are close in age. For a long time it was playdates and quick chats at pickup, and real estate never really came up. So when their Lone Mountain listing expired after six months on the market without selling, they reached out to me.
They had already moved. Their household had grown. They both work from home, and they wanted a much bigger backyard than their lot could give them. So they bought a home on a larger lot nearby, which left the Lone Mountain house sitting empty. Every month on the market meant another month of carrying two homes.
Reading the first listing
Why it sat
The sellers had never been given a comparative market analysis, so they priced the house themselves, close to $950K. The photos were taken on an iPhone, and the sellers disliked them enough to retake them on their own phone. There was no video, and open houses only happened when they asked for one.
The house had a lot going for it: single-level living, a low-maintenance yard, big Black Mountain views and a gated community with parks and paths. It also had two things buyers needed help with. A two-way fireplace sits between the formal and casual living areas, which was hard to picture in an empty house. And the lot backs up to a road that picks up school traffic at certain times of day. Neither is a dealbreaker, but with phone photos and empty rooms, buyers had nothing to help them see past either one.
The relaunch
What we changed
We started with a detailed CMA, the first real data the sellers had seen on their own home. Prices were softening from the pandemic-era highs, and more competing homes were coming on the market. We relaunched in the high $800s. We also agreed up front to watch the market closely and adjust together if it moved. We even talked through renting it out, so keeping it listed was a real choice and not a default.
Madison’s Note
The hardest pricing conversations are with sellers whose sense of their home’s value came from a different market than the one they’re selling in. I’d much rather have that talk early and honestly than watch a house sit while the gap gets bigger.
Staging is a call I make home by home, based on timing and logistics. This house had already sat for six months, so we used virtual staging to get it back on the market quickly. We staged the fireplace rooms two ways. One showed a floating living room built around the fireplace, and the other turned the formal dining room into an office or den. Buyers got two realistic ways to live in the house instead of one empty room they couldn’t read.
Then we got it seen:
- Professional photography, including twilight shots
- A professional interior and aerial video of the home and the community, with about 21,000 views on YouTube
- Three paid campaigns, including one aimed at the out-of-state markets many Cave Creek buyers come from. Together they added about 21,000 ad views and 575 clicks to the listing
- Posts across my social platforms, plus my newsletter
- 13 open houses with a colleague, and printed brochures about the home and the community
- Outreach to other agents and conversations with neighbors
Traffic was steady. The feedback kept coming back to the fireplace and the road, which told me the marketing was working and the rest was price. We made one reduction as more homes came on the market.
Closing the chapter
How it ended
The buyers were relocating from out of state and had been searching for a long time before this house came up. They went under contract in late January and closed about a month later. The price landed in the low $800s, in line with what the sellers needed.
For the sellers, closing was mostly relief. No more juggling two homes, no more keeping up a house they’d moved on from, and finally a chance to put their energy into the new place and that backyard. Our kids still see each other all the time.
★★★★★
“From preparing the house for showings to driving strong online visibility, every step was thoughtful, polished, and strategic.”
If your listing expired, it’s worth understanding why before you try again. This house didn’t sit because of one problem. The price had no data behind it, the empty rooms were hard to understand and there was very little marketing beyond the MLS. All of that was fixable.
Did your listing expire?
Let’s look at what the first one missed.
If your listing agreement has ended and the house didn’t sell, send me the old listing and a little about where you’re trying to land. I’m happy to talk through what I’d look at first, whether or not we end up working together.
