There are a lot of sellers sitting out there wondering whether to try and sell now or to hold off, at least until spring, in the hopes of seeing a better market then.

There's some data to suggest you might as well bite the bullet and do it now. The S&P/Case-Shiller index of home prices shows that the last real estate downturn, in the late 80s and early 90s, it took about seven years for the market to recover enough the prices began to rise again.

We're only a couple of years into this one. And, this downturn may play out differently. There are certainly plenty of interested parties, especially in an election year, who would like there to be some good news on the real estate front. But it seems unlikely that two years or maybe even three will be enough to move us back to rising prices given the amount of inventory out there.

And, you'll see an increase in the number of homes selling, I suspect, long before you see that begin to push up the prices of those homes.

So, if you're wondering whether to put your house on the market now or wait for the spring market the answer is that it probably makes very little difference in terms of the price you'll get for your home. What you should consider is that, as in most years, I expect the inventory to jump tremendously in the spring and the competition for the buyers will be much fiercer.

Maybe the real question is how will your home fare against the increased competition?

Buyers are always interested in how many days a property has been on the market. Buyers assume that the longer a property has been on the market, the more negotiating leverage they have.  And, generally speaking, that's probably true. That assumes, of course, that the seller really does need and/or want to sell!

Sellers, in this market, are very sensitive to days on market as well, and are worried about the perception buyers have as they see that Days on Market number increase.  Again, this is perfectly reasonable. They don't want to give buyers the impression they have more leverage, even if it might be true! No one wants to give away information that might hurt their negotiating position.

Sellers are asking more frequently how they reset the counter to show their property as newly on the market.  Many times they believe that if they withdraw their house from the market for a few days and then put it back on, that will reset the counter. Some believe that if they relist with a new agent the counter will go back to zero. Generally, what I tell them is that this doesn't work. But the full answer is a little more complex than that and this seems like a good place to go into a little more detail.

The Multiple Listing Service that we use in this area actually carries to Days on Market numbers for every listing.  They are shown as DOM-M and DOM-P. They stand for Days on Market-MLS and Days on Market-Property. The first one, DOM-M, does reset when you relist your home with a new agent. Or, if your listing expires and then is put back on the market a week or two later. But the second category, DOM-P does not reset unless your home is off the market for at least 180 days. Since both of these fields are available to both agents and consumers in the data they see, it's pretty hard to fool anyone about how long your home has been for sale.

As with almost everything in life, prevention is the way to go here! Price it properly, make sure it shows well and odds are most homes will sell within the average days on market for this area.