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As I have stated, I had a value in mind as to the worth. But I was willing and able to go up a bit from there. I was not "dug into" a price. The seller was. And my price was based on comps. His was not.
Your numbers sound fine assuming the lots for other homes were regular lots. Or lots that were on a busy street/near an eyesore and this one is a view lot or much more desirable. The desirability of a lot can drastically change value of home. If the other homes had similar lots, then your numbers sound fine.
His counter was a $10k difference. .......PSF is how I determine the value of a house, ......
So that is what? $10 difference every month on your house payment?
Price per square foot is a very inefficient way to determine price. However, you don't like the price on that house, go and find one that you like just as much, priced at the $107 a square foot price that you like. Easy solution. If that is the going price for a nice house in your chosen area, the market should have plenty of them on offer at that price.
So that is what? $10 difference every month on your house payment?
Price per square foot is a very inefficient way to determine price. However, you don't like the price on that house, go and find one that you like just as much, priced at the $107 a square foot price that you like. Easy solution. If that is the going price for a nice house in your chosen area, the market should have plenty of them on offer at that price.
No payment. Cash.
Price psf wasn't the only thing. That was a starting point. You're just looking at what others sold for recently.
If $10k isn't that much, why not the seller suck it up? Why do people keep telling ME that I should've been the one to suck it up?
He had an easy sale, a sure thing, flexible closing, no lender requiring repairs, I wasn't going to ask for repairs...as easy as it gets. And I was willing to take a house that has a neighbor's 10 ft wide gate opening onto this house's property...very odd. I didn't even take off the value for that. Oh, well.
if you're going to kick another agent to the curb because they didn't prescribe to your way of handling the home search, you really need to be very explicit with the next one how you believe every step of the way should occur. It will save you a lot of aggravation.
Also next time, go ahead and provide your counter of $2K higher and let your agent sell that as your highest offer.
One thing I found on our recent househunt and purchase is that there is no use spending time trying to figure out what is going on in sellers' brains. The houses that don't sell are because the sellers don't want to sell. I can't tell you how many houses we looked at which, based on the pricing, really weren't for sale at all.
As I have stated, I had a value in mind as to the worth. But I was willing and able to go up a bit from there. I was not "dug into" a price. The seller was. And my price was based on comps. His was not.
The seller had already come down before you made your offer. Then they came down some more after you made your offer.
And as I explained before, while there were things that lowered the value of the house in your opinion, I would expect there were things that seemed valuable to the buyer that made them think it was worth the price they were asking.
I have never suggested you should have paid more than you wanted to pay - just that the fact that you wanted to pay less doesn't mean the seller was completely unreasonable in wanting to get more. The fact that you were only 10K apart means that both of you were in the same general ballpark, just not quite close enough to make a deal.
Without knowing more, my guess is that both sides should have been able to give a little and get the deal done, but sometimes that doesn't happen, and IMO, it means the responsibility for that is on both sides, not just one. The fact that you are annoyed at your agent who felt that you should go a little higher suggests that there were in fact other valid estimations of the value of the house that were higher than yours. It doesn't mean you were wrong, but because it's a subjective amount, it doesn't mean they were wrong either. It just means you disagreed so you both move on, not that you were right and they were wrong.
if you're going to kick another agent to the curb because they didn't prescribe to your way of handling the home search, you really need to be very explicit with the next one how you believe every step of the way should occur. It will save you a lot of aggravation.
Also next time, go ahead and provide your counter of $2K higher and let your agent sell that as your highest offer.
I didn't kick her to the curb. She kicked me to the curb by doing the documents, where I had to remind her that hey...I need the age of the roof in writng (explaining to her how I'd been lied to years ago by sellers about that). I had to ask her three separate times before I got it.
She showed me houses that weren't fit to live in. Total waste of time. So she showed me a lot of houses, but I shouldn't have seen half of them.
This one...when I get the counter, she says only "they've asked for a later closing date" but I'm on the road & haven't looked at it closely yet. I open it and see they countered with $10k over my offer. I was thinking they'd counter a little closer than that.
The agent knew beforehand that I had planned on not going that much higher than my original offer. I told her that I got a verification of funds for only a bit more than my offer.
I emailed her and said well, I'm guessing he expects me to meet him halfway, $5k more than my offer. She emails back and says better make it $1 more at least, just to be sure. WTH? On what basis? I had emailed her my thoughts on why I was making the $ offer I was. She probably didn't read it.
The agents just want a quick sale. As some other agent told me, when I pointed out all the repairs that needed to be made to a house, "Oh, that's just money." Seriously.
So I admit that just got frustrated and felt pushed...no one working on my behalf, and a seller who has dug in his heels. So the deal was dead. I hadn't offered on it before because I didn't think that seller would sale for what I wanted to pay (based on comps), but my family and the agent said, "Well you don't know that until you make the offer." So I made the offer. Now I know.
It's too stressful and nitpicky to keep negotiating back and forth. If I thought I could counter with something he'd accept, I would have. But I knew he wouldn't accept it.
I was this way the last house I bought decades ago. He's already reduced a lot, after it hadn't sold in months. I made an offer. He countered. We weren't that far apart. I countered his counter (I had an amt in mind that I thought the house was worth). He was mulling over my counter and considering another counter, I think. So I decided I would not make another offer. I asked my agent to view a house for sale down the street, anticipating a refusal of my last and final offer. That did it. Word got back to the seller that I'd be walking, if he countered again. So accepted my offer, and that was the right amt to pay for that house. The appraisal came in very close to the sales price.
I'm more disappointed than I thought I'd be, though. When I made the offer, I made the jump from it being a house to me living in it.
There's actually another house for sale nearby...same builder. Sames asking price. But it doesn't need the work this one did and has the higher end features like canned lighting. Larger house, too. But the listing agency is the agency my agent I just used works for, so I don't know how that would work. If the whole agency is angry with me or what. I WOULD pay more for that house because it has a fully fenced back yard and the higher end features. Roof looks newish, too.
I also think some sellers are just not objective about their homes.
I was chatting with one of the neighbors in that subdivision. There had been another house for sale (owners had moved out...company transfer...but owners now back in house, since the transfer didn't work out). Anyway, that other house hadn't sold; neighbor said owners are perplexed why it didn't sell, since they had done so much to it, and it was a great house.
But I had viewed that house and knew very well why it hadn't sold. It had a swollen area in wall in utility area, like a leak. They had put in a door from garage into back yard...but it was not done well, and wasn't finished (still needed a door knob, casing, frame). They had put in all new laminate flooring in whole house...but it was the ugliest flooring ever. Horrible. It all needed to be replaced. Fence not in great shape. Exterior painting horrible (some sickly pale blue for all the shutters and the front door...unrelated to the interior of the house). Old a/c. Something weird about the master bath, but I forget what. And on and on. Yet, the owners saw it as this lovely place. It worked out, though, since the owners moved back in, since the job transfer didn't work out.
We have a house out here that was on the market for years. The guy wantedcwhat he wanted and he wasn't going to take a penny less. The market finally caught up. We also have those Zillow things where you can state your selling price. I can tell you if someone offered me 600k for my house...it would be a done deal. My house is worth about 350k.
It's not on the market, either.
People are very weird and emotional about their homes. Where I grew up, there's a stretch of homes where the land has gone commercial and a few of the homeowners are thinking Cha-Ching! But the fact of the matter is the buyer is going to have to buy multiple parcels, will have to tear down the existing homes and do something with water and sewer, and build a road to construct something on these parcels. They're not going to buy your house with all the updating and money you put into it. They're buying the land in its raw state.
Honestly, losing a house over $10k and not trying to negotiate further is ridiculous IMHO! I agree that the realtor should have got confirmation on the age of the roof ASAP and the inspector would have been able to verify that. Since the buyer already lowered the price tells me that they were willing to negotiate. I would have given them their $10k but ask that they pay closing costs or give you a credit towards a fence. I also would have called your agents managing broker and explained that this realtor was terrible & you demand to be represented by some one else who knows how to do their job.
Honestly, losing a house over $10k and not trying to negotiate further is ridiculous IMHO! I agree that the realtor should have got confirmation on the age of the roof ASAP and the inspector would have been able to verify that. Since the buyer already lowered the price tells me that they were willing to negotiate. I would have given them their $10k but ask that they pay closing costs or give you a credit towards a fence. I also would have called your agents managing broker and explained that this realtor was terrible & you demand to be represented by some one else who knows how to do their job.
All good points. I'm not great at thinking on the fly under pressure. I should have handled this better. An agent to guide me, although I can't push my failures off on someone else
But to my way of thinking, I'll paraphrase a couple of lines from the movie Out of Africa:
Quote:
Friend: You wouldn't lose a sale over $10k, would you?
Me: No. But the seller would.
(The movie line was:
Friend: You wouldn't lose a friend over a book, would you? (another friend hadn't returned a book)
Redford: No. But he would.)
Yes, I could've done the closing cost thing, or partial payment on the fence...I didn't think about it, frankly.
I got kind of flustered (and angry) when it was clear my agent wanted me to meet him halfway, when I had indicated that my top amt would be less than that. Maybe she could have suggested...meet his price and ask for closing costs and assistance with the fence cost.
Live and learn.
Thanks to everyone for your thoughts and opinions and advice. I have learned a lot. I will consult these posts when I make my next offer, for tips on how to handle the negotiating process.
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