Selling time and selling price: The influence of seller motivation

We consider the role that seller motivation plays in determining selling time, list price and sale price. A new survey of home sellers suggests that sellers are heterogeneous in their motivation to sell. Our findings are that a seller who, at the time of listing, has a planned date to move sells more quickly than one who does not. Also, the shorter the planned lime until a move at the time of listing. the shorter the actual duration of marketing time. We find that seller motivation affects sale price, but not the list-price markup. Our results suggest that theoretical models of the housing search process should be recast to allow for heterogeneous sellers.