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1300 Army Navy Drive #225

1300 Army Navy Dr #225 | Horizon House

Property Overview

The seller of Horizon House #225 in Pentagon City was moving across the country and needed a game plan to help sell her property. She did not want to spend a lot of money on improvements. And like all sellers, she wanted the upgrades that she did spend money on to have a high ROI.

If you have a limited budget, here are the top items to spend money on:

  • Replace outdated carpet with hardwood floors (laminate, LVP, engineered, etc)
  • Paint
  • Replace outdated light fixtures with new light fixtures

The seller did the three upgrades listed above and once those were completed, we partnered with a professional staging company to stage the property. At that point, the condo was almost unrecognizable from its previous state.

Online Marketing

We filmed the property video at Pentagon Row, showing off the condo building’s proximity to restaurants, shops and retail. In each of our listing videos, we try to create engaging ways to show off the property and the neighborhood. Some properties make it easy to film a creative video showing off the home’s unique features and interior. Other properties, let’s just say are a little more ordinary and require more imagination. This is one of those instances.

One-bedroom condos tend to call for more creativity so I decided to hop on the Capital Bikeshare bike for this video. Prior to being escorted off the Pentagon Row promenade for filming on “private” property, we were able to get all the shots we needed for the video.

We published the video on various social media platforms.

The Facebook video was seen by 1,191 people.

The YouTube video was seen by over 13,000 people. The YouTube video was then promoted on ARLNow.com. That cross-promotion resulted in an additional 269 people watching the video.

1,254 people saw the video on Instagram.

The social media marketing campaign resulted in an additional 15,000 people viewing the property tour video.

Results

The seller had a bottom-line number in mind that she wanted to walk away from the deal with. We came up with a listing price of $319,900 to help her achieve her goal.

As we watched the market, we saw that there were only two other one-bedrooms that were on the market in the community. One unit was a much smaller one-bedroom that could not be considered a comparable property. The other condo was a larger model that was in need of a full renovation. We determined there was not much competition as we were preparing to hit the market.

Even though there was low inventory, we started to notice condos were not selling as fast as they were earlier in the year. The pandemic had started to negatively affect the condo market. With the information in hand, the seller decided to increase the list price and come to the market at a price of $329,900.

We listed the property on Thursday, July 2nd. Ironically enough, another one-bedroom in the building came on the market on the exact same day. This newly-listed condo was fully renovated and priced higher than our listing at $349,000. It is not necessarily a bad thing that it came on the market as it positioned us as a better value play.

Two weeks passed by and another one-bedroom hit the market for $359,900.

The following week a third one-bedroom hit the market and the week after, a fourth one-bedroom hit the market for $350,000.

Consequently, we had gone from being one of the only one-bedrooms available to competing with five different one-bedrooms. With an abundance of condo inventory, it can be a tumultuous time to sell a condo.

We made a price adjustment 42 days into the listing to adjust the price from $329,900 to $324,900. Three days after the price adjustment, the seller accepted an offer on the property. We closed at $315,000, which gave the seller the net amount that she was looking to walk away with.

One question that remains is this: Would we have had better luck with an original asking price of $319,900?

The property took 43 days to get an accepted offer. The price started at $329,900 and the offer was accepted at $315,000.

Could we have gotten $315,000 (or higher) had we started with our original planned asking price of $319,900?

Either way, it is worth noting how quickly the market slowed to a halt at Horizon House. It was clear that we were heading towards a softer market in the building.

Here is a look at how the other 1-bedrooms fared:

#225 (our listing)

  • Listed: July 2nd
  • Price: $329,900
  • Price Decrease: $324,900 (August 12th)
  • Pending: August 14th
  • Close Price: $315,000
  • Close Date: September 4th
  • Days-on-Market: 43

#907

  • Listed: July 2nd
  • Price: $349,000
  • Price Decrease: $344,000 (August 11th)
  • Canceled Listing: September 26th
  • Re-listed with new brokerage: October 7th
  • New Price: $330,000
  • Price Decrease: $329,900 (November 5th)
  • Price Decrease: $320,000 (December 10th)
  • Status: Active as of December 9th
  • Days-on-Market: 151 (as of December 9th)
  • Canceled Listing: March 22nd
  • Re-listed with a new brokerage: April 8th
  • New Price: $309,500
  • Price Decrease: $299,500 (April 29th)
  • Price Decrease: $284,500 (May 13th)
  • Pending: June 14th
  • Close Price: $277,500
  • Close Date: July 8th
  • Days-on-Market: 322 days

#624

  • Listed: July 15th
  • Price: $359,900
  • Price Decrease: $354,900 (July 31st)
  • Price Decrease: $349,900 (August 10th)
  • Price Decrease: $344,900 (August 19th)
  • Pending: October 1st
  • Close Price: $339,650
  • Close Date: October 30th
  • Days-on-Market: 78

#928

  • Listed: July 21st Price: $349,000
  • Price Decrease: $339,900 (August 14th)
  • Price Decrease: $329,500 (September 10th)
  • Price Decrease: $324,500 (September 25th)
  • Price Decrease: $315,000 (October 1st)
  • Price Decrease: $314,900 (October 2nd)
  • Price Decrease: $304,900 (October 25th)
  • Price Decrease: $295,000 (November 19th)
  • Price Decrease: $290,000 (December 3rd)
  • Price Decrease: $285,000 (December 11th)
  • Price Decrease: $279,500 (December 29th)
  • Pending: April 3rd
  • Close Price: $265,000
  • Close Date: May 17th
  • Days-on-Market: 257

#630

  • Listed: August 1st
  • Price: $350,000
  • Price Decrease: $343,999 (September 7th)
  • Status: Withdrawn on October 14th (Did not sell)
  • Re-Listed: April 1st
  • Price: $320,000
  • Price Decrease: $310,000 (September 1st)
  • Pending: September 18th
  • Days-on-Market: 246

The market moves quickly. Be sure you are tracking sales on a monthly and weekly basis.