For sellers

How I market your home.

Most of the work happens before your home is ever listed. By the time it goes live, the photos are shot, the listing is written, and the comps are current. That’s what makes the first weekend count — and the first weekend is the one that sets your price.

27
listings sold
6 days
median on market
100%
of list price

Median across 26 of my own listings, from MLS closed-sale records. Every sale is listed here.

The launch sequence

The same five steps on every listing. Nothing here is improvised on the day.

  1. 01

    Photos and video, before we list

    I shoot them myself. I've been doing photo and video work longer than I've been selling real estate, which is why the walls in your listing photos are straight — the single most common tell of a listing shot in a hurry on a phone.

  2. 02

    The listing is written and loaded early

    Drafted in the MLS before we go live, not the morning of. When the moment comes to launch, there's nothing left to write.

  3. 03

    Comps pulled, then refreshed the day we go live

    An in-depth look at what's actually sold near you, and then pulled again at launch. A comparable from six weeks ago is a different number than one from this week.

  4. 04

    Live Thursday. Open house that weekend.

    Everyone who wants to walk through it gets a weekend to do it. Nobody is told the only showing slot is Tuesday at 2pm.

  5. 05

    Offers due Monday

    Depending on the price point, I set a deadline. It concentrates every interested buyer into the same window instead of letting them trickle in one at a time — which is how you end up negotiating against nobody.

What it has actually done

Two moves where the preparation was the whole difference. Both are in the MLS record.

Buying before selling

Two families bought their next home with an offer that depended on selling this one — and closed both on the same day.

A contingent offer only works if the listing agent on the other side believes your home will actually sell. So before either family wrote one, I had their photos shot, their listing drafted and their comps pulled. I could show the other agent exactly what was about to hit the market and what it would be priced at.

One home sold in 4 days, the other in 8. In both cases the sale and the purchase closed on the same day, so neither family owned two homes or none.

Paw Paw → Portage
$231,400 sold in 8 days · $300,000 bought · October 2023
Battle Creek → Battle Creek
$171,500 sold in 4 days · $295,000 bought · September 2025

Buying from out of state

A buyer who could not travel bought an $889,000 home without ever standing in it.

He was relocating to Michigan in December 2020 and could not get here. We did it over FaceTime — me on site with the camera, him asking the questions he would have asked in the room. He did not walk the house until he took possession of it.

I still do this for out-of-state buyers. Sometimes it is me holding the phone. Sometimes a friend or family member is there instead, which frees me up to look at the things a camera will not catch on its own — the grade, the roofline, what the basement smells like.

Grand Rapids
$889,000 · closed December 2020 · my largest sale

Want to know what yours would list for?

I work across West Michigan, based in Plainwell. Tell me about your home and I’ll tell you what the comps say today.

What’s my home worth?Text me

Jason O'Brien's track record

  • 5.0from 35 Google reviews
  • 27listings sold
  • 6 daysmedian on market
  • 100%of list price
See every sale →Read the reviews