Stephanie

Stephanie is a seasoned sales executive in San Francisco who values her time and makes a point of avoiding unnecessary stress.

When it came time to sell the Mill Valley home that she had fixed up, Stephanie wanted to avoid the headaches that come with preparing and listing publicly — not to mention the days-on-market risk when attempting a cold-season public sale.

“I was interested in testing the market because it was an odd time to be [selling]… The ability to skip the staging phase and the expense was also intriguing. The home also wasn’t in the best location to accommodate open houses.”

Stephanie was intrigued by Aalto after learning about a private home sale orchestrated by her agent, Whitney Rich.

“Only serious buyers and no neighbors? Can we sell my home that way?”

With no risk, and a lot of upside potential, Aalto was a no-brainer for Stephanie.

Stephanie also wanted to avoid the parade of people slowly creeping by her home, and maybe even knocking on the door, behaviors that are inevitable when your exact address is exposed publicly on Zillow.

“You don’t get all the lookie-loos… Aalto narrows it down to only serious buyers.”

Ultimately, Stephanie had her agent put Spacious Home in Mill Valley on Aalto because she believed it could get her the highest possible price.

“Aalto appeals to younger, more tech-savvy buyers, which I thought this house would appeal to.”

Stephanie was also concerned that Zillow focused more on generalized and sometimes-distracting information. There was also a concern the often-inaccurate Zillow Zestimate would cast her home in an unfair light, setting warped expectations from buyers.

“Zillow tells me about a neighborhood or previous ownership. It isn’t focused on selling this particular home. Worst of all, their Zestimate is wrong more often than it’s right, so it sets buyers up with the wrong expectations out of the gate.”

As an added bonus, Stephanie was able to get her home in front of buyers much sooner than she otherwise would have been able to do — all with no days on market or public record.

“We began marketing it sooner than we otherwise could. I probably would have spent another two to three weeks [hidden from buyers]… [With Aalto] I was able to close on it much quicker.”

The home debuted on Aalto on February 7 and was sold February 27, in just 20 days total.

“The interest level was quick and fast… and whatever the square footage was going at the time in Mill Valley, we went up a little bit and I got that price.”

In addition to getting the comp-beating price, Stephanie was able to do it all in total privacy.

“If you really don’t want your neighbors to know that you’re moving, you don’t want to alert everyone, just in case [it doesn’t work out].”

Because Stephanie’s home was vacant, her agent suggested Homeprint™, a digital decluttering and staging offering exclusively from Aalto, that gives buyers an instant vision of a home’s potential.

“Some people just can’t visualize, ‘Where would I put a table? Where would I put this chair? So [HomePrint] accomplished all of it. They could see the vision, but they also could also see how it looked without anything at all.”

Stephanie loved how Aalto forced buyers to make a decision quickly. “When a house matches your criteria on Aalto, you know you have to react quickly or someone else will.”

In the end, Stephanie’s experience on Aalto couldn’t have been better.

“Aalto fit my situation perfectly — and I think it could fit a lot of people’s situations.”