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A corporate relo seller listed a home (standard sale) for $799K this past Friday. He had several showings in the first two days - may have made him feel very optimistic. He paid $840K about 20 months ago. He is relocating soon - we think - and may have a month or two to get the deal done. He's asking $250/sqft for a very nice home on a very nice lot. Comps are closer to $230/sqft though those homes and lots aren't quite as nice. Only two homes in the past two years sold for more than $240/sqft (one was his).
We offered $740K ($231/sqft). He came back with $795K. We go to $755K he goes to $791K. We go to $775K ($242/sqft). (We're not going higher and we have a pretty good Plan B REO for which our offer was accepted). He goes down to $789K and says "That's it".
Oh ya? Less than 24 hours later he comes back with $785K if we can close by Sept 3 as he could avoid that last mortgage payment. We're thinking now that he blew us off at first thinking he'd get more - but he hasn't - and now he's feeling the pressure.
We're thinking of lowering our offer to $765K. "Listen buddy, we offered you $775K and you blew us off. You're desperate now and guess what? Now we're only offering $765K." It's a gamble but unless someone offers $770K for example, he might just have to take our offer.
Seems like a very odd way to negotiate. I can imagine a buyer coming back with a lower offer than they made before is going to be hard to swallow for the buyer. Personally I would look at it like one continuous negotiation. Both sides giving in a bit to try and meet in the middle. By lowering a previous offered price with no new information really goes against that. Just my humble opinion.
I think the key here is that you "have a pretty good Plan B." From what you are saying, you believe the seller needs to sell the house more than you need to buy it. If that's true, then pushing doesn't hurt you much, and might net your buyers $10,000. If you are willing to walk away, I'd say go for it.
I think the key here is that you "have a pretty good Plan B." From what you are saying, you believe the seller needs to sell the house more than you need to buy it. If that's true, then pushing doesn't hurt you much, and might net your buyers $10,000. If you are willing to walk away, I'd say go for it.
We're the buyers.
We are willing to walk away but we really do want this house but we will not pay more than $775K. The risk to us is that he would take our $775K but for some reason (like a hypothetical $770K offer out there), he wouldn't take our $765K offer.
I would restate my $775 offer with the message.....that was the best we could do....and if 9/3 works for me I would agree to it. His counter is still more than your last offer so why would you go lower when you'd already decided $775 was a good buy for you?
Lol...I think we went through the same exact thing just months ago.
Leave it at $775. That's what you decided was fair for the house, right?
We left ours at $750, they countered twice, we made it clear it'd be our only offer, and the sellers, realizing that the first offer is usually the best one, came back a couple days later and took it. Good for them - they got out of a house in about a week; good for us - we got the house we wanted at a great price ($25k less than appraisal in a very stable market).
Another seller who decided to play the 'taken aback' and 'insulted' and pompous 'that's my lowest, you're ever so insulting!' card a few months ago with us now has his house listed for less than our final offer to him. And it's still on the market. Lesson learned for that blowhard.
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