Another option would be to Auction it off. You can set a minimum bid that you're willing to accept... in other words if no offers come in to that amount you don't have to accept any offer.

Because you still live there you could attend the auction yourself, this will give you clues as to how much your property has interested the buying public and maybe even investors as well.

I would avoid a short sale if you can, it might come back to bite you.

The auction should give you a clear indication of what your property is worth and the interest someone has in buying it. A low turn out for the auction and you may be faced with some tough decisions.

The idea is to get out fast. This is what an auction can provide, but you have to look at it as a way out, not something that will likely be profitable for you.

It sounds like you need to do a financial analysis. It's hard to determine from the details of your post the issue. There are a number of options.

While my mortgage is only 15% of the value of my home, I have spent significant amounts of money in improvements. I won't see the investment returned. But, I have to live somewhere and it might as well be nice.

There is a market price for your property. You just haven't priced it correctly. It most likely will be a loss to you. Sometimes you have to take a loss to appreciate the gains of the future.

Thanks for all the responses. I know about all the options you mentioned except the auction route. I didn't know owners could do that. To give you an idea of how much the market has gone down, other properties, in my community, are going for around 20k less than what I paid for mine in the early 2000s. By the time I figure that in, with the upgrades, I lost money. The only positive has been a low mortgage at a low interest rate. I would never rent a place this size for what I pay. No, I would not be in an underwater mortgage, if I sold my home, at its current value. I have a very experienced and successful agent. He says my problem is not my price. The market is so bad that, to have an easy and very quick sale, I would have to sell for a price range in which the properties were selling in the 1980s. That's about ten to fifteen thousand dollars less than my asking price now. I would do that, if I were not going to have the added thousands in agent fees and closing costs. Then, there is always something an inspector finds to fix. I will say that some of the contributing problem is our HOA has not taken care of the property as they should have. We have one project that would improve things a lot, but it has not been addressed yet. There were other things, but I took the bull by the horns and saw to a lot of those things that helped with HOA finances and upkeep and they were completed. Doing all I can to get out. The problem with an HOA is you can't force others to approve projects or vote to have an assessment. I wish banks would routinely just let people pass on ownership where a new owner just takes over payments with small administrative fees. I won't have a foreclosure, but it seems like banks would eliminate a ton of them having that option for owners.

When my ex and I sold our first home back in 1993, it was during a recession. We bought the house for $176,000 and sold it for $169,000. We had also put in about $15,000+ in upgrades to the electric and a new kitchen, paint, wallpaper, etc.

We had lived there for almost 7 years. We were selling it because the school district wasn't wonderful, and we had just had a second child. The house was a 2 bedroom/2 bath, 1400 square foot house (no basement) on a 40' x 100' lot.

However the advantage to selling then was that it afforded us the opportunity to buy into a much better community with top rated schools and to buy a house that was larger and on a better lot. We wound up buying a 4 bedroom/2 1/2 bath 3600 square foot house with a basement on a 100' x 123' foot lot.

Because of the recession, we could afford that house, whereas 2 years earlier that house even if we had sold our first house for a profit, the price difference would have still had us priced out of buying the house in the better neighborhood.

My point being, it didn't pay for us to wait until the market improved to make back the money we "lost" in selling our first house. We looked at the first house as a means to get us to the nicer house and took advantage. We were able to sell our house in the recession because we had upgraded the kitchen and refreshed the whole house and made it look good.

You gain nothing by staying and you've had the advantage of living there for 16 years. Get out at whatever price you can sell it at. Staying will do you no good and if anything it's costing you money every single month to stay.

And I certainly wouldn't have stayed if a better job with more money and more chance for advancement had come along.

There are some assumable mortgages out there (FHA loans). But I'm at a loss to understand why you think that having someone 'just take over' your mortgage would be preferable to just selling it at whatever price the market will bear. Mortgage rates are at/near historic lows, so it's not like that's holding a buyer back. You still have equity in the home, so if you sell it you'll have that cash - money you wouldn't if you just handed over the mortgage.

I think what you really want is not possible - to sell your house for more than it is currently worth. I agree that if major HOA improvements were imminent that could boost the value of your home, but it sounds as if that is not realistic. So you need to sit down and work out the numbers on what happens if you just sell it for 10-15k below your current offer, and where it leaves you for your next stage in life. Believe me, as someone who sold a house at a loss, as painful as it was, the weight off of our shoulders at closing was one of the greatest feelings. We moved on and are happier than ever in our new home/jobs/community.

One of the traps that we all can fall into is something called the sunk cost fallacy. It is the basic idea of taking a loss on a something being bad. In the end, you are going to get out of your house with X amount of dollars, whether your life is better or worse is a function of how many dollars you need and what you will do with it and has nothing to do with whether or not it is more or less than you started with.

Instead of thinking how many fewer dollars than you used to have or should have had, think about how your life will better or worse without a house payment and that amount of money. Even if that amount happens to be zero.

bry911 says "Instead of thinking how many fewer dollars than you used to have or should have had, think about how your life will better or worse without a house payment and that amount of money. Even if that amount happens to be zero." - Excellent advice

If there's one thing in life we can't buy, it's "time" so if it's time to move on, even if you're taking a loss, it could be more valuable than actual $$.

Good luck.

You can look at the past or you can look forward. Your realtor is giving you good advice. You need make it neat and attractive. Then, you need to set a price for it. Continue to reduce the price at intervals until you generate offers. In order to swallow this loss, and the loss is only on paper because you have had years of use and enjoyment, you need to change your approach.

My aunt was in a similar situation. She purchased a condo at the height of the market. When she needed to sell, she had to swallow the facts that her condo and condo association were not first rate, nor would she get all of her money back in a sale. She lost about 25% on the deal. She considered herself lucky to be done and moved forward.

Dear Abby and Suzie Orman would advise you to move forward. Good things will happen when your way thinking about this changes. Holding onto this property and it's sad outcome will only serve to depress you further in your job and your life. Your realtor will earn every penny in commission finding and processing a buyer. Don't be penny wise and pound foolish.

Thanks for the comments. In answer to a post, I think it would be nice to just have someone take over payments because it would be attractive to a buyer and possibly quicker. I have a relative who did it in the 70s. It was an option for home buying then. It was a good move for both of them. The days of that option looks to be over. That is what gave me the idea. I have thought about rock bottoming my price to make it more attractive and to have my odds go up. However, what would be a pain is the thousands in agent's commission and thousands in closing costs I would still have to pay. I guess I will analyze and see.

Yes - the '70s were (largely) a time of rising interest rates, so your relative probably had a below-market rate which was very attractive for the incoming buyer to assume. Nowadays that isn't the case, even if you did have an assumable mortgage. And the underwriting process is the same from the bank's perspective, and the buyer would still want inspections, etc., so it really wouldn't save time either.

Anyway, I know you have a difficult decision ahead of you - to the degree that you can, take emotion out of it, and best of luck whichever way you decide.

Here is a cautionary tale. A relative of mine moved to a different city but decided to rent his house. Years later he discovered that with the rise in property values and the fact that houses in that area increased in size due to remodeling, his taxes raised enough that the rent on the house did not make all the costs and he was losing money. The tenants didn't keep the place in good repair, which made it impossible to rent for more. Many people told him to sell at a loss and move on, but it was the time that everybody was making a profit on housing and he didn't want to get back the same price that he paid on the house minus the selling costs, even though his mortgage was paid off. Then the housing crisis happened, some low income housing opened in walking distance, the house deteriorated and his health also. Now that he is finally able to deal with it, practically the only way he can sell is as a tear-down.

You have also to consider what will happen if the HOA keeps delaying projects -- the property will become less and less desirable as time passes, and the people it would attract will in turn want to pay less and less. Waiting is a good idea only if you can afford to take your time, and are prepared to handle the consequences, good or bad.

I know it's tough, and I'm sorry you have to make such a hard decision. Maybe you can look around and see what you can get for what you will have in the place you want to move in. As somebody posted above, a depressed market can work both ways.

Life is what happens when you're waiting for something better to come along.

The problem with the take over payments thing is typically these mortgages are what are called 'assumable'. I believe these are only FHA loans. The problem with assumable mortgages is if the person that assumes the mortgage, defaults on said mortgage they could drag your credit into the gutter with them.

My first home ( the one I eventually auctioned off) was an FHA loan, the realtor told me that whatever I do, do not let someone assume the mortgage.

I don't know how much if anything has changed since then as that's been 20 years or better. It was a learning experience and so the amount I lost was chump change considering it was a HUD home I bought at 32,5 / I probably had 10k in it at least. It appraised for 54k at the time I was trying to sell it.

I set a minimum bid of 30k for the auction. I wasn't living there at the time, it was sitting vacant for mostly 3 years or so. The highest bid came in at 29K. I managed to get this bidder to increase his offer to the minimum bid. Even then I didn't have to accept it. I told the bidder to give me an hour to think about it.

Took me less than 30 minutes to accept it. Best decision I made in my life was to cut that noose loose and move on.

The amount I learned from that was historical to say the least. (Also, I didn't attend the auction in person, I listened to it over the phone... so I knew how bad it was when the offers kept going down, down, down. --- If anything it will tell you exactly what it's worth... it's only worth what someone is willing to pay for it.)

These are 'as is deals' -- they're not going to require you to do anything except hand over the keys.

Airbnb?

Take the $10-15K hit and move on for your personal happiness. I've been through this before and once you get to your new location you'll tell yourself "I should have done this sooner". The condo is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it. Your realtor is giving you bad advice by telling you the problem isn't the price. It is not priced right if no one will buy it. What you paid for it or how much you've put into it has nothing to do with the sales price. You do not have control over the HOA, location, neighborhood, noise or similar issues that may be making the property less appealing to buyers. Get out.

It is hard to give you good advice without real numbers. I know it is hard to reveal your financial information to strangers but it can be really helpful. This is one of the reasons that I am a big fan of the anonymity on this board, while we may be judgmental we are judging an avatar rather than you. In the end, I am not sure that a creative solution is really what you need. I think you probably have a fairly typical problem that needs a fairly typical solution.

I could be more help if I knew your loan balance, payment amount and interest rate. It would be beneficial to also know the realtor fee % and if sellers typically pay all closing costs in your area (in my area buyers pay).

Mortgage Assumption -

Interest rates are so low today that no buyer is out there looking for an assumption. You can bet that any buyer who qualifies for an assumption and is also looking for a house doesn't need to jump through the hoops of an assumption.

Thanks for all the info. I will think about lowering my price. In the end, that may be all I can do.

Right now, you don't own the condo -- the condo owns you. I hope you will still have the job opportunities you have passed up. TIme to focus on the advantages of living there you have enjoyed and the money it saved you over renting and move on.

Good idea lowering the price ... freely assumable mortgages went away a long time ago, for good reason ... people didn't need to be qualified for the payment and then defaulted.

Loans that can be assumed include FHA, Conventional ARMs and VA, not sure about USDA. When a person goes through the newer credit qualifying assumption, the existing borrower is released from the liability and is not dinged for any credit problems after the assumption.

Rent to own? How is your rental market?

We bought a home, remodeled and as we were doing so prices went down quickly. We ended up having to take a loss (10-15k) to sell it but we figured a small loss was better than waiting. We sold to a woman whose husband had died of cancer recently (they were in their late 40's) and she couldn't afford anything decent in town because she had to sell her house at 100k less than when she first started out trying to sell it (prices dipped that quickly! in 2006). We decided that losing that money and selling to this woman would come back to us and were happy it went to someone who was thrilled to be able to have the updated home.

My son and his wife bought their CT dream house in May 2005. We all know what happened that fall. Fast forward to 2013 when his wife filed for divorce. House had to go. A year later, they sold it at an $800,000 loss. Yes, it still makes me nauseous to say that. Thank heavens they were not under water with their mortgage. The smart thing would have been for her to buy my son's share and continue to live there in hopes the market would rebound,. She move 1/2 mile away anyway, but she no longer liked the house just as she no longer liked my son. Sometimes one takes the loss and just moves on - my son has no regrets,

Price it to sell, not what you think it's worth. Lower the price until you get offers, then take the best one.

Life is passing you by while you fret and worry because the place isn't worth what it used to be. Accept it and move on.

My husband sold his parents home years ago using this method.

http://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/balloon-payment.asp