In pitching apartments for exclusives - the owner asks you to come over and see the place to construct the proper selling price.

Here's the catch - most times though (not all) - they don't want to know the right price - just the highest price.  Even with comparable sales, specific to that line of apartment, they just ignore the data and go for the highest price/or one of the highest prices given from brokers.

So you come in and give them an accurate price for selling and tell them they can start where they'd like though.  Then show all the research and data that supports this pricing 100%. (like comparable sales of the same line of apartments, year over year appreciation numbers..etc)

Then other brokers come in and give really high prices that it won't sell at but that panders to the owner's emotions. The owner wants to believe more than anything that they can get more money.  This is what con men utilize to hook suckers. 

To top it off more and more brokers give these BS - high numbers just to try and hook the listing.  In a job where you aren't paid a salary - for most people - it is far more important to get in the door than to be professional.  So the owner thinks - wow it must be worth more since 90% of the brokers gave me such high prices. 

Then they sign with the over-priced broker feeling they will get more money on the sale.  The broker, who overpriced the listing, then will ride out the down period of it not selling because it is over-priced and then work on the seller to reduce the price so they can bring it back to a real selling price in line with the market demand (like you suggested initially).

So do you knowingly just go in there and tell them a BS price even though you know that it is over-priced or are you honest about the appropriate pricing and risk losing the listing?

You have to read the person to know how to proceed but doesn't it seem like such hack work to consistently over-price with the strategy of breaking down the owner in the future for price reductions.  Since the owner signs a 6 month exclusive with you - they are in deep/locked in - and eventually will need to reduce the price from the over-priced number they were pitched in the beginning if they really need to sell.  Also some data points to the fact that the longer a listing is on the market, the lower the final selling price.  So with this over-pricing strategy - aren't you hurting the seller, who employed you in the first place to maximize their return on the sale of the apartment?

Yes you are!