Home Buyout Program-Jimmy Franklin? (Katy, West: sale, townhome, neighborhoods)

[kddaisy76]

hi all:
Ive been reading a lot of posts on this forum, but this is my first time posting. Hoping someone on here can give me some input/guidance.

We're looking into buying a ready-to built New Mark home in Pine Mill Ranch. However, we need to sell our current house. The builder refers us to The Jimmy Franklin Team Home Buyout Program, if we're heading this route. Basically, they will put our house on the market for 6 months, and if it doesn't sell, they'll buy it at 95% of the market price.
Has anyone used them for this own purpose? Any experience (good or bad) with them? I've also read somewhere that the builder will give them 3% of our new home purchase price, is this correct? If so, I guess I can negotiate on their 3% commission as oppose to 6%?

I'm worried that my house won't sell due to the current market. I did put my house on the market 3 years ago for over 6 months with no offer.
We also just recently upgraded our kitchen with granite countertop and repainted the cabinets, as well as install bigger sinks and nicer faucets. We also just replaced all the faucet fixtures in all bathrooms (except the showers). We also repainted our house, redecorated our house with home goods (as opposed to empty house last time it was on the market).

Any advices is greatly appreciated. I'm always nervous when it comes to selling/buying homes, and also dealing with agents.

Thank you so much.

[katydiva]

Yeah, we built with Newmark Homes in PMR about a year and a half ago. They sent us over to the same guy. We called him as a precaution, but he was not exactly nice to us. He actually got attitude with my husband on the phone when we had some questions. I am very glad we did not have to use him in the end. Our townhome in the Galleria area sold just fine for over our asking price in one month's time. No complaints on my end.

[cheryjohns]

Originally Posted by kddaisy76

hi all:
Ive been reading a lot of posts on this forum, but this is my first time posting. Hoping someone on here can give me some input/guidance.

We're looking into buying a ready-to built New Mark home in Pine Mill Ranch. However, we need to sell our current house. The builder refers us to The Jimmy Franklin Team Home Buyout Program, if we're heading this route. Basically, they will put our house on the market for 6 months, and if it doesn't sell, they'll buy it at 95% of the market price.
Has anyone used them for this own purpose? Any experience (good or bad) with them? I've also read somewhere that the builder will give them 3% of our new home purchase price, is this correct? If so, I guess I can negotiate on their 3% commission as oppose to 6%?

I'm worried that my house won't sell due to the current market. I did put my house on the market 3 years ago for over 6 months with no offer.
We also just recently upgraded our kitchen with granite countertop and repainted the cabinets, as well as install bigger sinks and nicer faucets. We also just replaced all the faucet fixtures in all bathrooms (except the showers). We also repainted our house, redecorated our house with home goods (as opposed to empty house last time it was on the market).

Any advices is greatly appreciated. I'm always nervous when it comes to selling/buying homes, and also dealing with agents.

Thank you so much.

Understand that of the 6% you pay him, 3% goes to the buyer's agent - so his part is 3%. You can try to negotiate down, but my guess is he is not going to deviate from his program because it works for him. Also know that you will list the price at what he recommends, not what you want. He makes that offer of buying it at 95% of his list price because he is going to list it under the others. He's not stupid - that's why he can make that deal.

As to his ethics, etc. - I like him and have worked with him. I like showing his properties because they show well (another requirement of the seller) and they are always under-priced. As another agent, I like it. As a seller, I don't think I would. He's not evil - he just works that program and it serves people well if they have to sell pretty fast (of course you can always under-price with anyone else and it will also sell fast).

If you want to negotiate, say, a 4% (3% still going toward the buyer's agent), based on the fact that the same agent will represent you with the new house - best to forget Jimmy.

I don't know why it didn't sell 3 years ago. Maybe it needed the updates you have since put in, maybe it was over-priced, maybe the neighborhood was just slow. All neighborhoods are not created equal here and you didn't say where you were.

[madrocket]

I used him as a realtor couple of years. I sold my house in Grand lakes and bought a perry in PMR. I did try this home buyout program but i dont think it is really 95%. You will lose some money but if you really have to sell the house quickly maybe this is an option.

I have to somewhat agree with Katydiva, I asked way too many questions and sometimes his emails are not "friendly". It took me 4 months to sell the house in a tough market. Regardless of how he is, all his support staff are excellent and helped me out in every which way.

Personally, I wouldnt do the home buyout program. Moreover I convinced Perry and Jimmy do the buyout as well. So you can look into that option if you like a perry home.

Again, this depends on your situation. I have a toddler and it was painful to step out, clean the house for every showing.

[ethanw]

We used them in our David Weekly home where DW will actually pay their 6% commision. Great folks to deal with. Andy our realtor was fantastic. After they inspected and appraised our house Andy said, that 224K is what they will pay for our house, which was exactly what we wanted. They also said that the house should sale very quickly even with other 13 houses in the market in our area.
Everything he said was spot on, we sold in 2 weeks for 224K.

Now my neighbor from my old place he also built a house next to me in the new place ,Riverstone, and he also used the buyout program. In his case his old house didn't sale for 4 months while his new house was built. When his new house was ready he unloaded his old house to Jimmy Franklin for the agreed price and he just walked out outta of his old house.

I think overal this is a very good program.

Originally Posted by kddaisy76

hi all:
Ive been reading a lot of posts on this forum, but this is my first time posting. Hoping someone on here can give me some input/guidance.

We're looking into buying a ready-to built New Mark home in Pine Mill Ranch. However, we need to sell our current house. The builder refers us to The Jimmy Franklin Team Home Buyout Program, if we're heading this route. Basically, they will put our house on the market for 6 months, and if it doesn't sell, they'll buy it at 95% of the market price.
Has anyone used them for this own purpose? Any experience (good or bad) with them? I've also read somewhere that the builder will give them 3% of our new home purchase price, is this correct? If so, I guess I can negotiate on their 3% commission as oppose to 6%?

I'm worried that my house won't sell due to the current market. I did put my house on the market 3 years ago for over 6 months with no offer.
We also just recently upgraded our kitchen with granite countertop and repainted the cabinets, as well as install bigger sinks and nicer faucets. We also just replaced all the faucet fixtures in all bathrooms (except the showers). We also repainted our house, redecorated our house with home goods (as opposed to empty house last time it was on the market).

Any advices is greatly appreciated. I'm always nervous when it comes to selling/buying homes, and also dealing with agents.

Thank you so much.

[kddaisy76]

thank you all for your input. Really help me greatly.

We live in an okay neighborhood, although the surrounding neighborhoods are not so good. We are a few streets behind West Oak mall , in west chase area. Our house is in a new part of a very old subdivison, where many houses are on sale. So I guess this does not do us any good. Although our house is only 8 years old, the majority of the houses in our subdivision are around 20-30 years old.

I dont know what is the best way to do this. I'm afraid it wont sell because of the surrounding neighborhoods, but since we also put in about 10k in remodeling we definitely don't want to lose so much money in this house either.
This is so hard to decide. Thank you so much for all your advices.

[houstonfan]

Determine what bottom price you're willing to sell it for so as not to lose any money. Determine, also, what you'd ideally like to sell it for while still being realistic about the market. If you can, see what they'd appraise it for and if 95% of it is more thanyour bottom price, I guess you can't go wrong with them. Sometimes having hanging on to an old house longer than you need it becomes more costly than selling it at a realistic price. As for his unfriendliness, hes' probably going to assign you to one of his underlings so you shouldn't have to worry about it much. ANyway, good luck!

[madrocket]

one last suggestion...if u want to do the buyout...do it as soon as you put the house on sale. Jimmy gave me an offer first. I rejected. I went back to him again after 2.5 months (which is a stupid idea) and the offer was really low. Jimmy's first offer and what I eventually sold it for were within $5k.

[kddaisy76]

hi Katydiva,

How long did New Mark take to finish your home? I'm trying to figure out when to put our house on the market so that we don't end up on the street before the new home is done. Thanks.

Originally Posted by katydiva

Yeah, we built with Newmark Homes in PMR about a year and a half ago. They sent us over to the same guy. We called him as a precaution, but he was not exactly nice to us. He actually got attitude with my husband on the phone when we had some questions. I am very glad we did not have to use him in the end. Our townhome in the Galleria area sold just fine for over our asking price in one month's time. No complaints on my end.

[madrocket]

u didnt ask...but they usually take 6 months...