time to buyer's accept or reject offer

[janischa]

hiya, while i know this will depend strongly from case to case, i was wondering what experience you've had in how long it took sellers to respond to your offer IN THE CASE YOU WERE OFFERING LOWER THAN ASKING PRICE. I send in an offer tuesday last week and haven't heard anything yet. I did send the broker a reminder yesterday, but no response yet. Since this is the first time ever i'm making an offer, i wonder if it's custom or not for your broker to send intermediary messages like 'we haven't heard anything yet, but will ask again' or so ?

 

[DVCconvert]

It does vary, but your broker should respond to you. Clearly I don't know who you are using, but I'm of the opinion there is at least one who does not operate on weekends, so you might not hear from your broker until next week.

 

[bookwormde]

I always put a time limit when I offer (3 days) so I do not have to worry about it.

 

[XGrumpy1]

If the sellers have not responded within a week, I think I would call the broker and tell them "let's move on".

There are so many great contracts available out there you should look for another one.

 

[scubakat]

We made on offer on 5/27 and the seller accepted 6/2... we were already looking at other contracts since I thought we were just getting ignored for our offer being too low.. then the seller accepted without a counter!

 

[janischa]

hmmm, i guess that's what i'll do as well. If by tuesday i haven't had any news yet, i'll mail to cancel my offer and to move on...
thanks for your opinions !!

by the way, here and there i seem to read people making offers on multiple contracts on the same time. this seems strange and not completely correct to me. what are your views on this ?

 

[scubakat]

I didn't know that was not allowed? We never asked our broker to do this but there were three contracts with the same use year and same points and the broker told us they put our offer out to all three?

 

[Deb & Bill]

I didn't know that was not allowed? We never asked our broker to do this but there were three contracts with the same use year and same points and the broker told us they put our offer out to all three?

If you made an offer on three different contracts and they all accept your offer, you have a contract to purchase all three. When a buyer declined on purchasing our contract that we were selling, we received half of their deposit they put on the contract. The other half went to the selling agent.

Personally, I think it's a bit scammy on the part of the buying agent.

 

[Sandisw]

If you made an offer on three different contracts and they all accept your offer, you have a contract to purchase all three. When a buyer declined on purchasing our contract that we were selling, we received half of their deposit they put on the contract. The other half went to the selling agent.

Personally, I think it's a bit scammy on the part of the buying agent.

I agree but until a buyer signs the paperwork, I think they could get away with the verbal offers and then back out.

I had a buyer put in an offer that I accepted. We sent the paperwork and within 7 days, the buyer changed their mind. In the end, it worked out for me as I ended up with $5 more per point with the 2nd buyer. Since there was no paperwork, there was no deposit required.

 

[Deb & Bill]

I agree but until a buyer signs the paperwork, I think they could get away with the verbal offers and then back out.

I had a buyer put in an offer that I accepted. We sent the paperwork and within 7 days, the buyer changed their mind. In the end, it worked out for me as I ended up with $5 more per point with the 2nd buyer. Since there was no paperwork, there was no deposit required.

But in seven days, you've lost the opportunity to sell you points.

 

[dbs1228]

I would not let an offer sit on the table for more then 48 hours UNLESS the broker informed me that the sellers were unreachable (vacation or family emergency) other then that there is NO excuse. A seller has 3 choices that are not too difficult to make, except the offer, reject the offer or counter offer. On 2 occasions 1 year apart from each other we had sellers that would not get back to us, the 1st time I was told they were out of town so I waited after 14 days I said no thank you the 2nd time I just did not hear anything so after 48 hours I moved on. Good luck

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

If you made an offer on three different contracts and they all accept your offer, you have a contract to purchase all three. When a buyer declined on purchasing our contract that we were selling, we received half of their deposit they put on the contract. The other half went to the selling agent.

Personally, I think it's a bit scammy on the part of the buying agent.

FL allows a 10 day cancellation period after signing the paperwork so the verbal offer isn't a contract that could be legally held to as I understand it. I had sellers back out twice on signed, agreed offers and nothing to show for it.

Personally I wouldn't put in multiple offers though. If I decided there was something else that looked better and I hadn't heard on an offer I'd call to back out of the first.

 

[adminjedi]

I always put a time limit when I offer (3 days) so I do not have to worry about it.

Right

As with any real estate transaction, every offer and counter offer should include a date/time response deadline. Personally, I believe 3 days is too long. You only need to give enough time for communication from your broker to seller and a little time to consider the offer. Depending on day/time of your offer, 2 days should be enough time. Giving less time is an effective tool to make sellers have to make a decision on your offer without time to wait for one or more others to come in as competition!

You should ask your broker to submit an addendum to your offer with a deadline for response or withdraw your offer.

 

[JimMIA]

A seller has 3 choices that are not too difficult to make, except the offer, reject the offer or counter offer.

Actually, they have five choices: accept, reject, counter-offer, ignore, and "think about it."

Especially if the contract is relatively new on the market and your offer is the first one the seller has received, they'll sometimes just wait to see what other offers come in. Other times, they may simply not respond at all because they are put off by your offer and just don't want to do business with you. Buyers often make low-ball offers in order to draw a seller into negotiations at a lower starting point, but that approach can backfire.

And...the decision is not always as easy to make as we might think. If you are dealing with a distressed seller, they may not have the authority to actually make the deal. Sometimes they need the approval of a soon-to-be ex, or some kind of court approval and they can't give you a quick answer. That can be a real can of worms.

But the broker should be able to tell you what the situation is. If there is a legitimate reason for not being able to reach the seller, the broker should be aware of it.

 

[juncker]

We had a very anxious seller. We had our acceptance within 6 hours! It is all going to depend on the seller. I'd hate to think that any broker would slow down the transaction (other than non-business hours).

 

[janischa]

ahhhh, this waiting is killing me
emailed the broker last tuesday, where she said she would pass my offer to the seller. no news, so emailed the saturday, no response (understandable). but today still no news :-(
yes, i know, i should just email the broker again, but i want to wait until tomorrow because i don't want to hassle her again and again. i'm just venting here thanks for listening !!!!

 

[scubakat]

ahhhh, this waiting is killing me
emailed the broker last tuesday, where she said she would pass my offer to the seller. no news, so emailed the saturday, no response (understandable). but today still no news :-(
yes, i know, i should just email the broker again, but i want to wait until tomorrow because i don't want to hassle her again and again. i'm just venting here thanks for listening !!!!

Me too!! Hope you hear back soon! We signed the contract and put the deposit in the mail.. now we are waiting for a signed contract from the seller.. Trying to be patient but keep checking for that signed contract back and a confirmation we are heading to ROFR!

 

[Disneychix]

ahhhh, this waiting is killing me
emailed the broker last tuesday, where she said she would pass my offer to the seller. no news, so emailed the saturday, no response (understandable). but today still no news :-(
yes, i know, i should just email the broker again, but i want to wait until tomorrow because i don't want to hassle her again and again. i'm just venting here thanks for listening !!!!

I would def hassle her today! And IMO it isn't hassling if she hasn't responded to you. It 'might' be a hassle to her if she had responded that she hasn't heard back and is trying (over the last 4 working days) to contact seller, but she hasn't even returned your message!

 

[janischa]

@ scubakat: keeping my fingers crossed for you as well

@ disneychix: you're right ! i'm going to send her an email now and be more firm let's see if that gets us further

 

[janischa]

and yes, only a few minutes after my mail (i hinted there were other interesting contracts, leaving in the middle if it could be another broker), she came back to me. i told her to tell the seller he still has until tomorrow before i cancel my offer and she said she will pass on the message and offered to pass my offer to a 'new' contract.... when i asked her if that new contract wasn't the one on the site, she said that that one was indeed the one she meant and it had been there since april. I told her that if tomorrow she didn't get any news of the seller, she could make the offer to a new contract. But this time i added the offer would only be valid for 2 days wise girls learn from their mistakes !!