Every week, someone is interviewing brokers to sell their New York City apartment. They've called in two or three agents, they're going to hear a few pitches, and then they're going to make one of the most important financial decisions of their life.
Most of them make it the wrong way.
Not because they're not smart. But because they're evaluating for the wrong things — asking the wrong questions, rewarding the wrong answers, and measuring success by criteria that have almost nothing to do with what actually gets a luxury property sold.
Here are the mistakes I see sellers make most often — and the truths behind each one.
Mistake #1: Choosing the Broker Who Runs the Best Comps
This is the most common trap. Every broker you interview is going to run a comparative market analysis. They're going to show you what similar apartments in your building and neighborhood have sold for. They're going to present a number that feels data-backed and authoritative.
Here's the problem: you can teach anyone to run comps. A first-year agent with access to StreetEasy can build a comp report. The question of who you should hire to sell your luxury apartment is not a question of who generates the most impressive spreadsheet.
The real questions are deeper: Does this broker understand the market not just at the neighborhood level, but at the building level? Do they know the specific units in your building that competed with yours, and why some sold and others sat? Do they know the managing agent? Do they know the board dynamics? Do they have relationships with the brokers most likely to bring a buyer?
That is market knowledge. It's not in a comp report. It lives in years of active participation in your specific slice of the market.
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Anyone can run comps. Not anyone can tell you that the buyer for your apartment is a specific financial executive who just took a role downtown and has been looking at this exact neighborhood for six weeks — because that broker knows who's in the market and goes out and finds them. |
Mistake #2: Not Asking for a Real Plan
When you interview a broker to sell your luxury apartment, you should be asking: What is your specific plan for marketing and selling my property? Not generalities. A real plan.
Who is the buyer? Not 'affluent buyers who want a great apartment' — that's not a buyer. A real buyer profile: their age bracket, their life stage, their income source, their reason for moving, and where they're looking right now. A broker who has done the work can tell you exactly who walks through the door and why. One who hasn't will hand you a brochure.
How do you reach that buyer? What specific channels are you using, in what sequence, with what message? What broker relationships are you activating on day one? What does the first 30 days of this listing look like on a calendar?
If the broker can't answer these questions with specificity, they don't have a plan. They have a strategy to list your property and wait. That is not good enough.
Mistake #3: Interviewing Three Brokers and Giving All of Them the Same Information
When sellers interview multiple brokers and share full details with each — their bottom-line number, their timeline, their motivation for selling — they've handed all their negotiating leverage to strangers before a single offer has arrived.
A sophisticated seller interviews brokers to assess capability. They don't volunteer their walk-away price. They don't explain that they need to close by a certain date. They don't mention that they've already purchased another property and need this to move.
That information is ammunition — and it belongs in your hands, not shared across every broker who walked through your door.
Mistake #4: Overpricing to 'Leave Room to Negotiate'
I've watched this destroy more listings than any other single mistake. The seller believes that listing above market gives them flexibility. What it actually does is burn the first 30 days — the highest-attention window — with buyers who look once, dismiss the property as overpriced, and move on.
The buyers who would have paid market value on day one are no longer interested by day 45. They've moved on to something else or found another property. What's left are the bottom-fishers who see a price reduction as proof that the seller is distressed.
I have a line I use with every seller I work with: you don't get rewarded for testing the market. You get penalized. The market is not a negotiating partner. It's a verdict.
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The Data on Overpricing In the current NYC market, the average sale closes at approximately 95.6% of ask — a 4.4% discount. That discount happens when a property is priced correctly. When a property is overpriced and sits, the effective discount at final sale is often 8–15% below original list price. Sellers who overprice frequently net less than sellers who priced right from the start. |
Mistake #5: Discounting the Commission
I'm going to say something that most sellers don't want to hear, and that most brokers are afraid to say out loud.
If your broker accepts a discounted commission without pushback, that broker has just demonstrated exactly how they're going to negotiate on your behalf at the table. Poorly.
I don't discount. My time is valuable. The platform I bring — Netflix, SERHANT. Studios, 8 million+ social followers, relationships across the entire broker community — commands what it commands. If that's not the right fit, I'm happy to refer you to someone who works at a different firm and does half of what I do. That's not arrogance. That's honesty.
And here's the part that actually matters to you as a seller: an agent who stands firm on their commission is an agent who will stand firm when a low offer comes in on your apartment. An agent who folds on the first ask is an agent who will fold when a buyer's broker tries to chip away at your price.
Your broker's willingness to protect their own value is a live demonstration of their willingness to protect yours.
Mistake #6: Treating the Property Like a Commodity
Every luxury apartment in New York City has something that makes it genuinely singular. Maybe it's a view that doesn't exist in another building on the block. Maybe it's a floor plan that was custom-configured when the original owner bought three units and combined them. Maybe it's the history — the neighborhood, the building's architectural pedigree, the cultural moment it represents.
Most sellers treat their property like a commodity: three bedrooms, two baths, 1,400 square feet, ask $2.8 million. That's a spec sheet. It's not a story.
Luxury buyers don't buy spec sheets. They buy the feeling that this property was designed for their life. The job of the right broker is to find that feeling and make every buyer who walks through the door feel it before they get to the kitchen.
If your broker can't articulate in two sentences what makes your apartment different from every other apartment in your building, find a different broker.
Mistake #7: Not Thinking About the Exit Before They Enter
Sellers should be having a conversation about exit strategy before they list — and most don't. What is your realistic walk-away number? What happens if the market doesn't respond in the first 30 days? At what point do you reduce, and by how much? What does your timeline look like if this takes 90 days? 120?
The sellers who are hardest to work with — and who typically net the least — are the ones who haven't had this conversation with themselves honestly. They hit the 45-day mark, and they're emotionally attached to a number that the market has already rejected, without a plan for what comes next.
The sellers who succeed have a clear framework: price right, market aggressively, adjust within 30 days if there's no traction, and protect the price integrity so we don't leave money on the table when the right buyer arrives.
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The best seller I ever worked with told me on day one: 'Nile, I want X. Tell me the truth about whether that's possible. If it is, let's go get it. If it isn't, tell me what is and let's do that instead.' That conversation — honest, strategic, ego-free — is the foundation of a successful sale. |
About Nile Lundgren
Nile Lundgren is the founder of The Lundgren Team at SERHANT. — the most followed real estate brand in the world — with over $500 million in career sales across New York City and South Florida. A cast member on Netflix's Owning Manhattan, Fox News contributor, adjunct professor at Baruch College, and nationally recognized speaker. He is one of SERHANT.'s earliest hires and a leading voice in luxury real estate, new development, and sales strategy.
Ready to list, buy, or invest? Connect with Nile and The Lundgren Team.
