In order to keep from lowering their asking price, home sellers are adding extra incentives to draw attention to their houses. To attract buyers, sellers are offering cars, European trips, landscaping for a year, and even 42″ plasma televisions at no extra cost.
It sounds to me like it’s getting tough to move houses by virtue of the house alone. Bubble or no bubble?
Published or updated January 27, 2006. If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to the RSS feed or receive daily emails. Follow @flexo on Twitter and visit our Facebook page for more updates.
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Luke Landes founded Consumerism Commentary in 2003 and has been building online communities since 1990. Luke, also known as Flexo, has contributed to PC World Magazine, US News, Forbes, and other publications. 
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
We just sold a house and left the wall-mounted 42″ plasma with it. It was a bit of a deal sweetener, but it was also much less of a hassle. Unmount it, pack it, move across states and hope it doesn’t break, repatch the drywall, repaint the wall, etc. It also wasn’t a top of the line model either, so it’s not like it was a $3000 TV (I think it was $1600 IIRC). Probably would have fetched $1000 on ebay (maybe). Take out a couple hundred for the trouble of unmounting it, etc., and I viewed it as not that much of a financial incentive to take it vs. the difference it made when showing the house.
These are great for potential buyers, but come on – can’t we just sell a house as it is anymore? I hope that it doesn’t start to mirror being a car salesman!