UPDATE: Who has six visits to a house for sale they don't want to pay for??

[RadioNate]

we had a heck of a time selling our house and while I'm glad to be done with it, I'm still bitter about the sale. The fact is that people hear 'buyers market' and they think every seller is ready and willing to bend over and take it....

The people who bought our house battered away at us so much that we just sold to be done with it. Our realtor even cut his commission to get the sale done when we said we were budging anymore.

And frankly I wish we had been a little tougher with the people we bought our house from even though they had to pay $40k to close.

 

[chris1gill]

I'm holding out for Family #3......wonder when they'll show up to walk thru....

Family #3 could be 2 years off LOL... I'm sure it will sell at some point. There aren't a lot of buyers in this market, so I'm fine with it. Right now I guess we are about 16K apart & if I were them I'd put it on a zero percent credit card at the moment since they want to move in ASAP in order to sell their house. Obviously they could pay that balance once they sold their house.... I can't say they are being unreasonable, unreasonable was the first family... this family is trying to reach for something they can't obtain under their current scenario... I'm okay with that, they tried, I won't budge further, there's no reason to, I've already budged & 11 realtor's already agreed TODAY that the house was a bargain as it sat.... so, I'm going with this...

This house WILL sell, it will sell today & six hours from now is a new today! It's my motto & I'm sticking with it! If it doesn't sell, I will move back into it in five years!

Although I really do think this couple would do well in this house, so I really do hope they come up with a scenario they can manage....

RadioNate, Family #1 was like that, so much so I took the house OFF THE MARKET.... Now I've just written a letter that said I would not entertain them in my house since they've seen it six times, and further negotiating is not necessary. So full price to them! I took it off the market for months while my MIL was still in there & when I put it back on, they CAME BACK after the nightmare they put us through the first time!

 

[Disney Doll]

If it is not a financial burden to keep the house, the right buyer will come.

 

[chris1gill]

Well, no further word this evening (not surprising considering the time of the last call), but I've made two suggestions to my realtor via email. Keeping in mind there is not a lot of activity in town, I suggested two possibilities to her.

It would seem we are about 15 grand apart due to the potential buyers not wanting to do a contingency sale with their pre-existing house....

My first suggestion was that she and the other broker consider taking a reduction in realtor fee's down to 4% from 5%

Secondly, of the money due that would be remaining, I could owner finance the remaining money due, not a lot of money IMHO.... For such a small amount of money I would be happy to do it. Due either when their house sells or within 24 months, whichever comes sooner.

So I've given some good alternatives to come up with the extra money without including a contingency to the sale....

I'll call my realtor in the morning to be sure she got my email to her... She has a lot of holdings from us, I'm sure she'd cut .5% & the other broker involved would be selling the potential buyer's house, I'm fairly sure she'd take the .5% discount as well.....

So, we'll see how it all turns out, either way, it's all good, these people are more than reasonable considering what we first dealt with LOL....

 

[PaulaSue]

Oh you guys crack me up...

I just heard back from my realtor, they came up 8 grand (big whoop), I came down 3 or 4 more & said that was about it.

My realtor called back and said "here's the thing" according to their realtor, they have this particular loan amount. They do have a house they will be selling, but it is not on the market. They just wanted to buy this caliber of home without tapping into the equity of the first home.

So, basically, I do not think they have the financing in place to purchase the home... it may be a contingency sale or no sale at all. What they are offering to pay isn't worth my selling since I'm already really low.

BUT, I totally appreciate they haven't taken six visits and 8 hours of my time, my husbands time, my realtors time and their realtors time LOL... these are normal people and I really would like them to buy my house, but I can't sell it for what they have available.... so I guess the watch continues!

Course, 4 parties have looked at the house with 2 offers, it can't be that bad LOL...

De Ja Vu (or how ever you spell that). Almost like my night. The woman is going through a divorce and not really have the money right now. Deal not totally off the table but our "deal" is we can still show the house and accept any offers (2 showings the next 2 days).

 

[KariC]

Good thinking!

Way to keep a level-head, and emotions out!

 

[chris1gill]

De Ja Vu (or how ever you spell that). Almost like my night. The woman is going through a divorce and not really have the money right now. Deal not totally off the table but our "deal" is we can still show the house and accept any offers (2 showings the next 2 days).

I just posted on your thread! So what's the deal? She wasn't able to counter back to you? Or is the deal just dead for now until she has the money?

KariC, I really do think these people are reasonable and that is the only reason I suggested what I did (although it was past 9pm when I did)... but we are close and they are reasonable, they have assets they can't tap into immediately, and I can understand that, having been on both sides of the fence. They love the house, it totally fits their needs, and personally I think it's meant to be, so I hope they take me up on my offer!

Believe me when I say this is about a thousand times better than what the first family put us through, that was worse than heck.... I mean how many owners do you know that actually get SO fed up, they just pull their houses off the market??? I had to for my own sanity and it actually wound up much better that way.

As an aside, how much do you want to bet my realtor is calling Family #1 to say we have an offer & do they want to counter.... I know my realtor, she had better not, but somehow I bet she does....

 

[KariC]

i was wondering if she would too....

hey a bidding war watch!!!

 

[chris1gill]

i was wondering if she would too....

hey a bidding war watch!!!

I beg of my realtor, don't involve Family #1, I will be headed to the nearest psych ward & I'm quite serious, those people were NUTS.... my realtor doesn't care, she knows how much money they have (and they have it), so she's going after them, I just know it.... I swear if they present an offer and then go back on it, I'll go after my realtor who happens to be my friend!!!

If it wasn't me involved, I'd actually find the whole thing humorous, UGH!!

 

[mickeysgal]

Well, no further word this evening (not surprising considering the time of the last call), but I've made two suggestions to my realtor via email. Keeping in mind there is not a lot of activity in town, I suggested two possibilities to her.

It would seem we are about 15 grand apart due to the potential buyers not wanting to do a contingency sale with their pre-existing house....

My first suggestion was that she and the other broker consider taking a reduction in realtor fee's down to 4% from 5%

Secondly, of the money due that would be remaining, I could owner finance the remaining money due, not a lot of money IMHO.... For such a small amount of money I would be happy to do it. Due either when their house sells or within 24 months, whichever comes sooner.

So I've given some good alternatives to come up with the extra money without including a contingency to the sale....

I'll call my realtor in the morning to be sure she got my email to her... She has a lot of holdings from us, I'm sure she'd cut .5% & the other broker involved would be selling the potential buyer's house, I'm fairly sure she'd take the .5% discount as well.....

So, we'll see how it all turns out, either way, it's all good, these people are more than reasonable considering what we first dealt with LOL....

Given the two suggestions you handed them, I would imagine the realtors will be less likely to be willing to cut their commission and rather go straight to having you get on the hook for financing the rest of the money for the buyers. To be honest, I would have suggested the owner financing as the ultimate last resort after seeing if the commission can be cut first.

 

[chris1gill]

Given the two suggestions you handed them, I would imagine the realtors will be less likely to be willing to cut their commission and rather go straight to having you get on the hook for financing the rest of the money for the buyers. To be honest, I would have suggested the owner financing as the ultimate last resort after seeing if the commission can be cut first.

It's a twofer deal, it has to include both or I won't do it.... it's not an either or proposition, it's a "If you want to sell this house and make your own mortgage payment this month you will take a cut and I will finance the remainder if the potential buyers are interested in doing so...." I'll totally make that crystal clear in my call in the morning.... Just to make sure we are on the same page...

 

[mickeysgal]

It's a twofer deal, it has to include both or I won't do it.... it's not an either or proposition, it's a "If you want to sell this house and make your own mortgage payment this month you will take a cut and I will finance the remainder if the potential buyers are interested in doing so...." I'll totally make that crystal clear in my call in the morning.... Just to make sure we are on the same page...

Very good, very good.

Best of luck! Hope you get some sleep tonight. I know when we've been in the middle of negotiations, it's hard to relax and get a good night's sleep.

 

[chris1gill]

Very good, very good.

Best of luck! Hope you get some sleep tonight. I know when we've been in the middle of negotiations, it's hard to relax and get a good night's sleep.

How did you guess? I'm wound up tighter than a clock at the moment.... THIS is why I hate negotiations. Even when we bought the house we are in, it took something like 5 or 6 days, it was very frustrating.... I don't think I slept the whole time But, I think these people have obviously been very responsive, so I don't see that kind of timeline, I'm assuming we'll either have something worked out tomorrow or we'll be done with them & will look for infamous Family # 3

 

[PaulaSue]

I just posted on your thread! So what's the deal? She wasn't able to counter back to you? Or is the deal just dead for now until she has the money?

NOT sure all of the details. What I heard was from DH telling what the RE said. If I got it right, her $ fell through since her divorce didn't go through today like it was to. She wants 2 more weeks to get a loan (or whatever) and we (RE demanded it) can still show our house and take other offers. The RE is not sure she can actually get the money and none of this was told in the first offer and the RE is NOT happy. RE is coming over tomm night to fill us in more so back to square one unless things turn around.

On a good note a family is coming tomm that canceled 2 times (once them and once the RE was sick) and they seem motivated even knowing a poss contract and then Sat is another family who also knows a poss contract and that the other family coming.

 

[mickeysgal]

Secondly, of the money due that would be remaining, I could owner finance the remaining money due, not a lot of money IMHO.... For such a small amount of money I would be happy to do it. Due either when their house sells or within 24 months, whichever comes sooner.

I've never considered owner financing before, so this is all foreign territory to me. What happens if they don't sell their house and you hit the 24 month mark? They still owe you the money and nothing effectively has changed, right? Then, what do you do? What rights do you have on the house?

 

[chris1gill]

NOT sure all of the details. What I heard was from DH telling what the RE said. If I got it right, her $ fell through since her divorce didn't go through today like it was to. She wants 2 more weeks to get a loan (or whatever) and we (RE demanded it) can still show our house and take other offers. The RE is not sure she can actually get the money and none of this was told in the first offer and the RE is NOT happy. RE is coming over tomm night to fill us in more so back to square one unless things turn around.

On a good note a family is coming tomm that canceled 2 times (once them and once the RE was sick) and they seem motivated even knowing a poss contract and then Sat is another family who also knows a poss contract and that the other family coming.

Wow! you must be in a busy part of the country (there are a few left thank goodness, our old house isn't in one of them however)..... funny enough I get letters to sell my new house all the time LOL.... it's a desirable neighborhood and few homes are ever for sale... Anyhow, you're in a little bit of the same boat, my Realtor did not know these people were not qualified for the entire amount until this afternoon.... she was shocked by it actually, she was led to believe otherwise by their realtor.... she now has the paperwork & knows what their loan is for, they're about 70 grand low, so they need cash out of their old house or something to make up the 16 they don't have.... We have no other showings right now, I can count on one hand how many offers there have been in town since October Ours was the last one in October when I pulled it, and the next one wasn't until about a month ago... the town is S-L-O-W, but things under or around 300 are starting to move, homes like ours on average are sitting 270 days.... so we're really lucky that we seem to be getting offers at all....

 

[chris1gill]

I've never considered owner financing before, so this is all foreign territory to me. What happens if they don't sell their house and you hit the 24 month mark? They still owe you the money and nothing effectively has changed, right? Then, what do you do? What rights do you have on the house?

We've done owner financing before. You are on an amortization schedule just like any other loan would be, the terms could be negotiable, whether they would want to pay the money out over time leading to 24 months, whether they would want to start payments at 24 months, that's a whole other set of negotiations, but I'm fairly easy to deal with. It's a mortgage written up by a lawyer, and we would be the second mortgage holder to the house.... it would all be negotiable as to terms. I'd obviously like the money when they sell their existing house... but we'll see if they're even interested in owner financing, or perhaps they do have a different avenue they can pursue.... Oh, as for rights, we'd have the same rights as a bank would have to call in the loan. But it's such a small amount in this case, I don't see it as a problem.... after the realtors drop their fees by a percentage point, maybe 10 grand, not a lot of money....

 

[BernardandMissBianca]

I beg of my realtor, don't involve Family #1, I will be headed to the nearest psych ward & I'm quite serious, those people were NUTS.... my realtor doesn't care, she knows how much money they have (and they have it), so she's going after them, I just know it.... I swear if they present an offer and then go back on it, I'll go after my realtor who happens to be my friend!!!

If it wasn't me involved, I'd actually find the whole thing humorous, UGH!!

tell if she even thinks about calling them, she's fired. That would really irritate me if my agent called them after I told her not to. No matter what you still don't have to accept their offer.

I would love to be Family #3, but I'll have to pay someone to take our house. Nothing ever moves in this town, ever!
Plus I don't think DH would want a big house again. We had 2500 Sq foot in GA, a 3200 sq ft in northern CT, and this one is 1100 sq ft. We are happy with 2500 - 2750.
I will probably end up building, I'm picky, not crazy family #1 picky, but picky.

keep us posted, I hope family #2 can come to an agreement.
Oh and our agent took a 3% cut to get us in this house. The house was going to be foreclosed on the day after we closed if we didn't close (we had no idea) and the seller still had to come to closing with $$$. He could only come up with 1/2 so our agent "loaned" him the money out of the commission and the seller had to pay him back in allotments.

 

[chris1gill]

tell if she even thinks about calling them, she's fired. That would really irritate me if my agent called them after I told her not to. No matter what you still don't have to accept their offer.

I would love to be Family #3, but I'll have to pay someone to take our house. Nothing ever moves in this town, ever!
Plus I don't think DH would want a big house again. We had 2500 Sq foot in GA, a 3200 sq ft in northern CT, and this one is 1100 sq ft. We are happy with 2500 - 2750.
I will probably end up building, I'm picky, not crazy family #1 picky, but picky.

keep us posted, I hope family #2 can come to an agreement.
Oh and our agent took a 3% cut to get us in this house. The house was going to be foreclosed on the day after we closed if we didn't close (we had no idea) and the seller still had to come to closing with $$$. He could only come up with 1/2 so our agent "loaned" him the money out of the commission and the seller had to pay him back in allotments.

Wow, how long ago did you move to your town? Has the market really gone downhill as well where you are?

I'm terribly picky & that's why our house has every imaginable feature, but it's far too big, about 4250 square feet, plus a 3340 square foot basement... pretty big. It was good when there were six of us, but then we took a job transfer & bought two houses in the same town, one for us & one for MIL....

I'm confused about your house though, so the realtor took a 2% commission? Or was that two realtors sharing a 2% commission & then the owner still didn't have enough & had to take even more from the realtor? Yikes! No wonder so many realtors are going out of business! Just WOW!

 

[BernardandMissBianca]

We've lived here almost 6 years. My parents moved here when I was 11 and we moved back because DH travels 45 weeks per year for work and I needed help with the kids. The market has always been slow here, we are a pass through town that is stuck between 2 major towns. But with the housing market it's just dead. We are out in the middle of nowhere and not close to anything but the casinos but not close enough to them either, ya know what I mean?
The market is still somewhat ok in New England compared to other parts of the country but it is slowing rapidly.

Oh what I could do with a 3200 Sq Ft basement!!! I would have the most excellent scraproom in creation! LOL But the house in northern CT was so big at 3200 for the whole thing. We had 4 rooms that we never even used. Now that the kids are bigger we could use the space but I still don't need a dining room or a formal living room. It was just a lot of house. Plus the garage was in the basement and I didn't like that at all. I loved the bonus room we had over it but up and down the stairs with 2 babies, groceries etc not great.

sorry I meant 2%, typing in the dark here. It was a 5% commission split between the 2 agents, our agent opted to give up 2% so the numbers balanced out. I'm not sure how it all got worked out, but we had already moved our stuff in and our agent didn't want the bank to take the house.
Our agent did eventually get all his money (plus the commission from our other house) but it took almost a year.
This guy was so upside down in the house it was nuts! I guess his girlfriend was here and supposedly paying half the mortgage but she decided she didn't like country life. (pig farm across the street and a mushroom farm down the road). Plus he thought he could grow *ahem* plants in the back yard, until the field was hayed the first time. So he grew them in his basement instead. He got behind in his payments really quick. Quite the character all the way around!

And the kicker! DH lost his job about 2 hours after we signed the papers. Post 9/11 aftermath in the technologies industry. Thankfully we had the proceeds from the bigger house to live off of til he found work again. It was a crazy year!