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Asking Price and Price Discounts: The Strategy of Selling an Asset Under Price Uncertainty

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  • Tapan Biswas
  • Jolian Mchardy

Abstract

We consider fixed and asking price strategies in the context of selling an asset with Bernoullian updating of the seller’s subjective probability of sale at a given price. The determination of optimal fixed, asking and endogenous reservation prices is discussed under risk-neutrality and expected utility maximisation. With risk-neutrality, the optimal asking price exceeds the optimal fixed price when the expected gain is a strictly concave function. The seller’s choice between the fixed and the asking price strategies depends on several factors: the expected cost of haggling, price competition and the seller’s attitude towards risk. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2007

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  • Tapan Biswas & Jolian Mchardy, 2007. "Asking Price and Price Discounts: The Strategy of Selling an Asset Under Price Uncertainty," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 62(3), pages 281-301, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:theord:v:62:y:2007:i:3:p:281-301
    DOI: 10.1007/s11238-007-9031-9
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    Cited by:

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    2. Egozcue, Martin & Fuentes García, Luis & Zitikis, Ricardas, 2012. "An optimal strategy for maximizing the expected real-estate selling price: accept or reject an offer?," MPRA Paper 40694, University Library of Munich, Germany.
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    4. Martín Egozcue & Jiang Wu & Ričardas Zitikis, 2017. "Optimal two-stage pricing strategies from the seller’s perspective under the uncertainty of buyer’s decisions," Journal of Statistical Distributions and Applications, Springer, vol. 4(1), pages 1-25, December.

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