Dynamic and Static Asking Prices in the Sydney Housing Market
Published online on January 18, 2016
Abstract
This paper investigates the impact of two commonly used asking price strategies on house sales prices. In particular, we compare a dynamic asking price, where the seller adjusts her asking price over time as she fails to sell her property, with a static asking price, where the seller sets an asking price and sticks to it until the property is sold. While we show this comparison to be ambiguous from a theoretical perspective, our empirical study, using a comprehensive dataset of the properties sold in the greater Sydney region in 2011, indicates that properties with a dynamic asking price sold, on average, for approximately 1.9 per cent less than properties with a static asking price. In addition, we show that, controlling for the asking price strategy, the duration of sale has a significant impact on sales prices.