It has long been an industry practice in many markets to take a "stale" listing off the market. What should you do with a listing that has not sold for over six months or even a year? Home buyers are being warned against a "deceptive" real estate practice: using relisting to hide actual "days on the market" of aging properties.

GuideToRealty.com cautions home buyers that real estate multiple listing services may contain days on the market(DOM) that make listings appear fresher than they really are. They further state, altered DOM's render an important piece of buying information useless or potentially misleading, and only someone with a detailed knowledge of the area's home market would know the difference.

San Francisco columnist, Carol Lloyd has called the practice "the real estate equivalent of turning the odometer back to zero." Lloyd further states that despite the apparent deceptiveness of this practice, real estate professionals are split on whether or not it is ethical; creating what she calls a "gulf between the relisters and their critics."

I personally feel that the odometer analogy is a little extreme. I can understand how some could construe that the buyer's motivation is an important element to a negotiation and it is. I do not feel a home has potentially any less value if it has been on the market for 1 day or 1 year to the buyer. The market will always determine the price, but effective marketing can help. In fact in some markets the homes value could increase over time and a price increase may be warranted. The relisting does not always have a negative connotation: the surrounding neighborhood could have improved, the seller has finally decided to make the suggested improvements, or the seller needed their summer off from the selling process. Professionals I have talked with view the relisting as a marketing strategy. Different MLS's have different policies on how long the home must be off the market. I have seen policies ranging from a few days to 60.

The question of the day: is relisting a bad marketing tool? This practice could make the real estate professional viewed poorly in the eyes of the consumer. What do you think: Is it ethical? Have you relisted? Should there be a consistent policy developed on actual days on the market? Is it important to a buyer? Lets blog...