Researchers have found that people who list their homes or make offer on homes using precise numbers tend to get closer to what they want:
They looked at five years of real estate sales in Alachua County, Florida, comparing list prices and actual sale prices of homes. They found that sellers who listed their homes more precisely – say $494,500 as opposed to $500,000 – consistently got closer to their asking price. Put another way, buyers were less likely to negotiate the price down as far when they encountered a precise asking price. Furthermore, houses listed in round numbers lost more value if they sat on the market for a couple of months.
The issue here is one of basic psychology. When you give a precise number, the other party is more likely to assume you've put extra consideration into how you've arrived at that number.
There's no reason to think this doesn't apply beyond house hunting, such as with salary. Imagine you make $14 an hour and you believe you deserve $17. Step one is to shoot higher than you want (while not being unreasonable). That means you might want to start negotiations at $20, but that number (aside from being a big jump) sounds like you're just trying to reach a certain level; it doesn't automatically sound like the number is directly tied to what you necessarily think you're worth. (Maybe it is directly tied, but that doesn't make any difference to whether or not it sounds like it is.) Instead, ask for $20.25 or $19.75. (Personally, I'd go for $19.75 because it doesn't represent the mental block that comes with $20, so I think it'd be given more consideration.) Now it sounds like you know your exact worth. Of course, you'll also need to justify your request by citing your accomplishments, industry standards, your position, etc, but now you've set the tone.
Across a series of studies, we found that precise first offers act as more potent anchors than round first offers. For both buyers and sellers, in both controlled vignettes and unscripted dyadic exchanges, precise opening-offer recipients made more modest adjustments in their counteroffers, yielding more value to precise offer-makers. Study 2 revealed that this effect carried through to final settlements, with final deals being more heavily anchored by precise opening offers than round ones. These effects were due at least in part to attributions that offer recipients made: compared to round first offers, precise first offers were seen as more informed and reasoned, leading responders to make more conciliatory counteroffers.
Submitted February 05, 2017 at 04:24AM by NoSpicyFood http://ift.tt/2l6LFop
