When sellers hold out for a higher price, they often believe the math is on their side. According to Martin Hawley, team lead at The Hawley Team at Keller Williams Realty Fort Myers & The Islands, that belief is frequently wrong. The gap between what sellers think they’re paying to hold a property and what they’re actually paying can reach thousands of dollars per month.
For most sellers, those hidden costs go unnoticed until an agent runs a full carrying cost analysis. Understanding the full carrying cost of an unsold property — beyond taxes and insurance — can shift a seller’s focus from the asking price to the monthly cost of waiting.
Sellers Miscalculate Carrying Costs
Most sellers account for the obvious expenses when deciding whether to hold firm on price: property taxes, insurance, and perhaps HOA fees. What they consistently leave out, according to Hawley, is the opportunity cost of the capital tied up in the property.
His argument is straightforward. If a seller owns a property free and clear, that equity is capital that could be deployed elsewhere — in a brokerage account, a CD, or another investment — generating a return. Every month the property sits unsold, that potential return is forfeited.
“They think they know what it costs — the taxes and insurance — but they forget about the opportunity cost of that money,” Hawley says.
The $400 vs. $2,300 Gap
Hawley points to a specific transaction to illustrate how dramatically this miscalculation can distort a seller’s decision-making. A client who had purchased a condo outright — no mortgage — believed the monthly carrying cost was roughly $400, covering taxes and insurance. When Hawley’s team ran the full analysis, factoring in the opportunity cost of the cash tied up in the property, the real monthly cost came out to $2,300. That figure accounts for the foregone return on the equity locked in the property, calculated against conservative investment benchmarks such as CD or money market rates available at the time of the transaction.
Once the numbers were laid out, the seller’s answer was to reprice and sell. “Once we pointed that out, it changed the whole conversation,” Hawley says.
This recalibration represents a nearly sixfold underestimate. For a seller holding out for an extra $20,000 or $30,000 on the asking price, the math can quickly invert. Holding for six months at $2,300 per month in true carrying costs means absorbing $13,800 in losses — before accounting for any price concession ultimately required to close the deal.
Why Overpricing Persists
Even as local conditions tighten, overpriced listings continue to stall. The Fort Myers market has moved into what Hawley describes as a seller’s market, with single-family home supply at around 4.3 months — down significantly from a year ago. But supply alone doesn’t rescue a mispriced listing. “If a seller wants to overprice the property, it just sits,” Hawley says. “If they price it right, it sells.”
The persistence of this miscalculation likely reflects the gap between how often sellers encounter carrying cost decisions — a handful of times in a lifetime — and how often agents do, which is dozens of times per year. Without a clear framework for calculating opportunity cost — a concept more familiar to investors than to typical homeowners — sellers default to visible, tangible expenses and ignore the invisible ones.
This disconnect slows the market, keeping sellable properties off buyers’ radar longer than necessary. Properties that could sell quickly instead accumulate days on market, which signals weakness to buyers and can trigger further price reductions beyond what an earlier, accurate pricing decision would have required.
Reframing the Price Talk
The carrying cost analysis has become a standard part of how Hawley’s team works with sellers who resist pricing recommendations. Rather than debating comparable sales or market conditions in the abstract, the conversation shifts to a concrete monthly number — one that accounts for taxes, insurance, and the return the seller is forgoing by not liquidating.
According to Hawley, his team closed 139 transactions in 2025, and he says the carrying cost framework has become one of the more reliable tools for moving sellers off unrealistic price anchors. The approach doesn’t require a seller to capitulate on price immediately. It reframes the question from “what do I want to get?” to “what is this waiting to cost me?”
As Fort Myers continues to rebound from the inventory surge that followed Hurricane Ian and inventory tightens further, agents who can quantify the true cost of holding may find themselves with a meaningful edge in listing conversations. The math alone, as Hawley’s example shows, can be more persuasive than any debate over comparable sales — turning an emotional pricing decision into a financial calculation most sellers can evaluate on their own terms.
About the Expert: Martin Hawley is a Team Lead at The Hawley Team at Keller Williams Realty Fort Myers & The Islands, serving the Fort Myers and Southwest Florida market. His team closed 139 transactions in 2025.
This article is intended for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal, financial, or investment advice. The views and opinions expressed herein reflect those of the individuals quoted and do not represent an endorsement of any company, product, or service mentioned. Readers should conduct their own due diligence and consult qualified professionals before making any investment decisions.