I laughed at this story; one of the agents in my office was talking to a prospect yesterday about his house.  The prospect said he wanted to list the house at $900,000.  The agent had done a comparative analysis and market research on the home and said that the most they could ask for the house was $799,000. 

The seller said that he needed $900,000.  The agent went through everything and told him how Realtors and prospective agents look at what is listed and what has sold.

After they had discussed all of the comps, the seller said something I thought was very funny.  He said “I need a naive agent”.  He wanted an agent who did not know all of this stuff and would be excited about listing my house at $900,000.  The agent replied, “that would be fine, they could list it all day long, but I can assure you that in today’s market nobody is going to pay you that much”.

The seller thought if he found an agent who did not know what the house was worth, they would be excited to have a listing and they would work hard to get it sold. 

Unfortunately for this seller, it does not work that way.  This seller needs a naive buyer, and in today’s market, this does not exist.