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It's possible they'll tell people at the open house that they already have an offer, yes. They might even say how much. However, they could do that anyway (that is, lie), and while that's both unethical and (I'm not sure, but probably) illegal, it's quite common (the lying about it part). Some buyers might go "oh no we'd better make a better offer immediately!" but a lot might say "oh, we don't want to get into a bidding war, nevermind" or "this guy is trying to trick us into paying too much, screw him". I went to several open houses and inquired after at least a dozen houses, and while we were sometimes told that there were existing offers on a house, we were never told the dollar amount. It seems to me that most sellers' agents are of the opinion that disclosing an amount may either drive away bids, or encourage minimum-raise bids (e.g., someone who might have overbid by a lot, knowing what the current high bid is, instead only overbids by a thin margin). All that said, I think there's nothing wrong with having the first offer in. You don't know if that open house will attract a load of buyers, one or two, or nobody at all. It is after all December, Christmas shopping season, and the slowest time of year for house sales (few people want to be trying to close and move during Christmas, or when it's snowing, etc.). Putting a super-low time frame on an offer, rescinding an offer and then lowering it, etc. are "hardball" tactics that might work or might backfire. A seller who is desperate to sell might well capitulate: another seller might decide you're scum and refuse to sell to you regardless of the competitiveness of your offer. Ultimately I think the best advice I ever got was, make an offer that you are comfortable with, and then don't worry about it. You might win, you might lose, or they might make a counteroffer; react to that at that point. When my wife and I made our offer, it was the first day the house was available, early December. Nobody else made an offer, ours was accepted in three days, and we were happy about it. Maybe we could have gotten it a bit cheaper? We'll never know, so it's not worth stressing about.
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Dec 1, 2011 21:41
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Leperflesh posted:When my wife and I made our offer, it was the first day the house was available, early December. Nobody else made an offer, ours was accepted in three days, and we were happy about it. Maybe we could have gotten it a bit cheaper? We'll never know, so it's not worth stressing about. This is my exact situation in that it's only been on the market since Monday. Except we're pretty sure other offers will come in, we're just hoping they come in lower than ours (we offered asking price). The only other comparable homes on the market right now are foreclosures and dumps that need a ton of work. This place stands out as being at a good price and being move-in ready. We've already been burned on two other houses recently where our offers came in just after they had accepted both an offer and a backup. It sure as hell doesn't seem like a buyer's market now despite it being december.
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Dec 1, 2011 21:54
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just had an inspection done on the house we are trying to buy. So, same time of year as you. We offered roughly 77% of asking price and they accepted. I recommend lowballing, it is a buyers market and there is plentiful housing stock to choose from. E: well i guess it depends on the city. my advice isnt really applicable or helpful, sorry. Molybdenum fucked around with this message at 13:56 on Dec 2, 2011 |
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Dec 2, 2011 13:43
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jerkstore77 posted:Just put an offer on a house and the listing agent is saying that the sellers wont be looking at offers until the day after the scheduled open house this coming Sunday. Are we at a disadvantage for putting in an offer so soon before they undoubtedly get more on Sunday? Can the listing agent tell people browsing the open house that they already got an offer of "this much" and that they'd have to offer more? When we sold our house last month, we were in the same position that the seller in your story was in. We got an offer on Day 1, but we held off on deciding until a week later, after our open house. We received 2 more offer during the week and 1 more after the open house, but we ultimately went with the first offer we got because it was the best offer they put forward. Just put in your best offer, time that submit doesn't put you in a disadvantage really except that it make it difficult for you to shop for other houses in the mean time.
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Dec 2, 2011 17:45
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We've spent about 6k in the first week as homeowners! DO NEVER BUY!
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Dec 2, 2011 20:25
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on what?
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Dec 2, 2011 21:06
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FCKGW posted:When we sold our house last month, we were in the same position that the seller in your story was in. We got an offer on Day 1, but we held off on deciding until a week later, after our open house. We received 2 more offer during the week and 1 more after the open house, but we ultimately went with the first offer we got because it was the best offer they put forward. Friend of mine just sold his house for list (very high IMO) in suburban Detroit in an area that is arguably trending downward. Received multiple offers and closed quickly. It really is situational as to whether you should low-ball or not. I strongly agree with the advice of picking a price where if you went one penny over, and didn't get the house you would not be upset and going from there. Oh, and make sure you're able to afford it... Your mortgage broker's opinion on whether you can or not should be ignored
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Dec 2, 2011 22:16
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I'm curious about re-financing my house in order to free up some cash to pay off some outstanding credit cards. I bought my house out of foreclosure, so the mortgage remaining on the house is about $155k but the value of the house which is either $175k (Zillow, which doesn't get my neighborhood), $185k(realistic value), or $200k (sale value per an agent on my block). The bank appraiser will be the final judge.... What I'd like to do is free up some of the equity in order to get some cash but also put some of the equity back toward the house in refinancing so my monthly mortgage payments don't go up too much. Does that sound like a realistic idea? This house originally sold for $240k in 2003 before the crash so it should be worth even more as things turn around and I plan on living here for several more years. Not sure this is the exactly correct thread for this question but it's somewhere between this thread and the personal finance thread....
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Dec 2, 2011 23:06
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tadashi posted:Does that sound like a realistic idea? No. It doesn't look like you have enough equity to do a cash-out refi assuming 80% LTV cap. Even if banks are back to stupidly allowing higher LTV on cash-outs, the amount of equity you could acess will still be quite limited. And don't forget that cash out refis have higher interest rates than standard refis.
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Dec 3, 2011 03:28
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Molybdenum posted:on what? Probably the termite and radon problems the house she bought had.
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Dec 3, 2011 03:41
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PoliSciGirl posted:We've spent about 6k in the first week as homeowners! DO NEVER BUY! We spent about 10k and haven't even moved in yet. Trying to fill a house nearly 4x as large as your old one with furniture is fun! In great home-buying news, the bank we're buying our house from just told us yesterday that we're waiting on some paperwork on the city to clear a lein on the new house. Apparently they're backlogged and this will push the purchase of our house back a few days to a week. Of course they gave us this news after they botched our notary docs, threaten to pull out unless they got their Earnest Money THAT DAY, refused to install garage door openers that are missing, and have never once called my agent to update us on the status. Oh, and apparently they've known about this city delay for the last 2 weeks but still rushed us through everything regardless. So here I am with a 20-foot U-Haul filled with half our house, taking 2 days off from work, friends and family coming over, furniture and appliances being delivered that weekend and having to call my agent asking when we're getting the keys tomorrow and hearing that we will not, in fact, be moving that weekend. DO. NEVER. BUY.
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Dec 3, 2011 06:03
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sheri posted:Probably the termite and radon problems the house she bought had. No, all that was paid by the seller. Some trees were touching the house that needed to be taken down and that was 3k. Our fuse box needs to be expanded and that's 2k and another 1000 for minor stuff such as installing a dryer. There's other stuff, but the items are just because we didn't have them at the old pad (like drapes).
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Dec 3, 2011 13:32
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tadashi posted:I'm curious about re-financing my house in order to free up some cash to pay off some outstanding credit cards. I bought my house out of foreclosure, so the mortgage remaining on the house is about $155k but the value of the house which is either $175k (Zillow, which doesn't get my neighborhood), $185k(realistic value), or $200k (sale value per an agent on my block). The bank appraiser will be the final judge....
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Dec 3, 2011 16:54
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What's a realistic percentage that you can negotiate down on the price of a home (or in my case, a condo)? I am looking at a place that's about $265,000. I'm thinking more like $230,000. Think the seller would get offended?
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Dec 3, 2011 23:11
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tadashi - while there could be a little bit more wiggle room for you depending on what the appraisal actually ended up coming in at, and possibly depending on what type of loan you were already in (one post mentioned an assumed 80% LTV, which is pretty common but not necessarily the case) it might be pretty tough to accomplish both of your goals. Obviously there could be some compensating factors that you havent mentioned that make you more qualified to end up with a loan, but a lot of it will depend on exactly how much equity you want to take out of your home. Before you can the whole idea entirely though, consider whether or not a different type of refinance (rate and term or a streamline -which is unlikely but who knows what your currently in) might allow you to free up cashflow every month that maybe helps accomplish some of what your trying to do with a cash out - just over a longer timeframe.
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Dec 4, 2011 00:04
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Ingraman posted:What's a realistic percentage that you can negotiate down on the price of a home (or in my case, a condo)? I am looking at a place that's about $265,000. I'm thinking more like $230,000. Think the seller would get offended? Don't ever be concerned about "offending" a seller. If you feel the property is worth 230 then put in an offer. Worst they will do is reject or counter your offer.
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Dec 4, 2011 00:14
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jerkstore77 posted:Are we at a disadvantage for putting in an offer so soon before they undoubtedly get more on Sunday? I don't think so, especially since it was a full asking price offer. Are the sellers aware of your full price offer, or are they not accepting offers at all until after the open house? If they know they have a full price offer on the table the only reason to even have the open house is to hope that someone else is interested and it creates a bidding war (or perhaps they will get a better offer, like all cash). For the seller this tactic is understandable. As the buyer, how willing are you to let the house go? If you don't want to get caught in a bidding war, make your offer expire before the open house. Force the seller to choose. It may be too late for that, so set it to expire on Monday or Tuesday. If the home is priced such that there will be more than one full price offer on the table you have to either accept that there will be a bidding war or walk away.
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Dec 4, 2011 06:29
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FCKGW posted:Don't ever be concerned about "offending" a seller. If you feel the property is worth 230 then put in an offer. Worst they will do is reject or counter your offer. This. gently caress the seller. Also, it's a condo, they're probably much harder to sell than a SFH (for good reason). Can you see what units have sold for in the same building recently? Zillow should have them.
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Dec 4, 2011 15:38
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Realjones posted:I don't think so, especially since it was a full asking price offer. Are the sellers aware of your full price offer, or are they not accepting offers at all until after the open house? If they know they have a full price offer on the table the only reason to even have the open house is to hope that someone else is interested and it creates a bidding war (or perhaps they will get a better offer, like all cash). For the seller this tactic is understandable. As far as we know they are aware of our offer. I'm not too worried about an all cash offer because we're in a relatively low end of the price range, and most buyers are going to be first time homebuyers. quote:As the buyer, how willing are you to let the house go? If you don't want to get caught in a bidding war, make your offer expire before the open house. Force the seller to choose. It may be too late for that, so set it to expire on Monday or Tuesday. If the home is priced such that there will be more than one full price offer on the table you have to either accept that there will be a bidding war or walk away. We're not too willing to let this one go without a fight to be honest, and will gladly bid a little higher if need be. Of course it would be just our luck for this house to be the only house in this city to go over asking price in the last 6 months. That's one thing I dont get. My agent says this property is priced correctly, but considering that we've looked at complete dumps that were priced $50,000 higher than this house (they had more square footage but were still dumpy as hell and had zero charm), this place really stands out in the current listings. I guess people place square footage at a higher premium than we do.
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Dec 5, 2011 18:46
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Overpaying for the right house isn't really that bad. If you get a serious home inspection from a true professional, have researched auxiliary costs such as taxes and HOA fees, feel that the location of the house is ideal for your work/family situation, and have mortgage terms that fit within your financial plan, there is little reason to walk away. A lot of people skimp on the home inspection, so a solidly built home with no problems is undervalued in the market, while homes with serious issues that costs thousands to repair are overvalued, because the inspector didn't catch the problem or underestimated its' severity.
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Dec 5, 2011 19:26
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Except there are plenty of cheap homes without any issues that are move in ready on the market right now and they're getting cheaper all the time given home inventory, foreclosures, falling wages/benefits, still high unemployment, rising cost of living, etc. Also
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Dec 6, 2011 09:22
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gvibes posted:You don't say what you bought the place for, but it's 155k, a bank is not going to want to lend more than that right away. The original mortgage was for $159k so, on paper, there's only about 4.5k difference. Since I'm new to refinancing, I didn't know about the standard 80% LTV thing. I had talked to a mortgage banker at my credit union briefly and I'm surprised this concept didn't come up. She seemed to put the deciding factor on the appraisal. If the appraiser came back at $175k, it sounds like they might still be hesitant to pull the trigger on refinancing at a lower rate. A house around the corner from me and very similar to mine just went on the market for $209k so I'm watching it pretty closely to find out the final sale price. My current rate is 5.375% and I was mostly interested in refinancing because it sounds like I might be able to push that rate down. The idea to cash out was just a side idea but, obviously, I'd get a lot more out of the lower rate in the long run. tadashi fucked around with this message at 16:22 on Dec 6, 2011 |
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Dec 6, 2011 16:16
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PC LOAD LETTER posted:Except there are plenty of cheap homes without any issues that are move in ready on the market right now and they're getting cheaper all the time given home inventory, foreclosures, falling wages/benefits, still high unemployment, rising cost of living, etc. In my situation this hasn't been the case the last few months. Currently in my price range (< $400,000), there are 12 listings in the area I'm looking for single family homes. 3 of them describe severe damage to certain parts of the house, 6 others use the "needs a bit of TLC" buzz words in the description, 2 others are surrounded by apartment complexes and are generally in bad areas. That leaves the one we just put an offer in which is really the only one of the bunch that is move in ready, and we just learned from our agent that they received 3 other offers as well. We find out tonight.
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Dec 6, 2011 17:25
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Without the search thread function available, I was having a bit of a time finding any info here on this. But basically, I'm not mistaken in my belief that Toronto is loving retarded, right? Here's our financial situation: Newly married, combined household gross income of just over $100K, approximately $40K in savings right now, and my wife's parents have offered at least an additional $10K, free and clear. I have a few thousand owed on my OSAP, but the interest rate is low and I'm only paying about $90 monthly, but we have no other debts. We don't own a car, and we don't plan to. We'd like to be able to buy in a year or so. Hot drat, we're making decent money, no debt, no kids. poo poo should be easy, right? Right now we're renting a one-bedroom apartment for the LOW LOW PRICE of only $1400 a month! It's starting to feel really cramped, and we're both pining for some breathing room, and things like a yard (me and her), a garage to tinker in (me), and really, just a place to call our own, where a fresh coat of paint won't feel like we're just making some other guy's place look pretty. I've looked at condos, and that poo poo is out. Condo fees are almost always above $500. It's hosed up. I don't know why anyone buys these places. Looking at homes... holy poo poo. Doing a search for detached homes under $400,000 creates a black hole in the city. On the east and west side, you might find a few places in the $350,000 range, most of which are described as "a renovators dream!". I don't mind doing some work on a place, but I don't want to end up stretching our budget to the limit only to find myself doing five-figure repairs within the first year. They're also mostly bungalows, which is okay, but I'll be god damned if I wouldn't like a second floor. Semi-detached homes are slightly cheaper, but half of them are converted SFHs, and, in my experience renting from places like this, the dividing walls tend to be wafer-thin. I don't want to hear my neighbour's cat farting in the middle of the night, and I don't want to have to keep the volume on poo poo below 2 for the rest of my life. I just don't loving get it. It seems like I'm hosed no matter what I do. If I buy a condo I pay out the rear end on condo fees. If I buy a SFH I pay out the rear end on the mortgage. If I leave the city I pay out the rear end to buy a car. If we rent a bigger place, our savings every month diminish severely, making it less likely that we'll be able to buy in the future, and we don't get a yard, garage, etc.. gently caress.
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Dec 6, 2011 17:32
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man thats gross posted:Without the search thread function available, I was having a bit of a time finding any info here on this. But basically, I'm not mistaken in my belief that Toronto is loving retarded, right? The #1 thing that stands out to me is HOW much cheaper is stuff outside of the city? Cars are expensive, but if a house is $200,000 15 miles away vs $400,000... well, a car doesn't cost THAT much.
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Dec 6, 2011 17:47
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cstine posted:The #1 thing that stands out to me is HOW much cheaper is stuff outside of the city? Cars are expensive, but if a house is $200,000 15 miles away vs $400,000... well, a car doesn't cost THAT much. Toronto has a fairly robust commuter rail system, doesn't it? Though I don't know how friendly any of those places would be for a car free lifestyle.
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Dec 6, 2011 17:51
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cstine posted:The #1 thing that stands out to me is HOW much cheaper is stuff outside of the city? Cars are expensive, but if a house is $200,000 15 miles away vs $400,000... well, a car doesn't cost THAT much. We could probably find a place in the $300,000 range, but there's a few issues with that. My wife doesn't drive, and she doesn't want to. She just never felt comfortable behind the wheel, which is fine. I wish more people who don't feel like they can operate a car safely would get the gently caress off the road instead of nervously plodding along making life more dangerous for everyone. But I digress. She'd be 100% reliant on me or public transit to get around. That poses a problem because I work Mon-Fri-9-5, and she doesn't. Trains to and from the city tend to operate only at peak hours, so she'd be taking the bus a lot to get to work. If she wants to go out when I'm not home, she pretty much can't. I grew up in Markham, and not driving pretty much isn't an option. Nothing is within walking distance in these places, and the transit blows. I still remember the day it took me an hour and 45 minutes to take the bus home from work in Markham. It was an 11km trip. Nothing special happened, just traffic. The other part of it is, when and if we decide to have kids, she wants to be able to A) hop on the TTC to get them where they need to go, and B) be relatively close to her parents, who happen to live in the city.
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Dec 6, 2011 18:03
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man thats gross posted:We could probably find a place in the $300,000 range, but there's a few issues with that. My wife doesn't drive, and she doesn't want to. She just never felt comfortable behind the wheel, which is fine. I wish more people who don't feel like they can operate a car safely would get the gently caress off the road instead of nervously plodding along making life more dangerous for everyone. Own less poo poo then? That is the tradeoff of wanting to live in the city, you are just going to have to live with a smaller place than what you would get in the suburbs. And it often times makes even less sense to buy.
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Dec 6, 2011 18:09
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jerkstore77 posted:In my situation this hasn't been the case the last few months. Give it some time. Inventory is usually pulled off the market after summer and then put back on once spring comes around. There are also lots of homes being held off the market by the banks to prop up prices, depending on who you ask and what numbers you look at its somewhere around 3-8 million homes nationwide, which is the so called "shadow inventory". The banks want you to be stupid and jump in and rush without thinking. Don't be their fool. Especially to the tune of ~$400K.
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Dec 6, 2011 19:12
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man thats gross posted:Without the search thread function available Off-topic but if you have search, you can still make this kinda work by sticking threadid:123456789 into your search terms as well.
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Dec 6, 2011 19:31
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Chin Strap posted:Own less poo poo then? That is the tradeoff of wanting to live in the city, you are just going to have to live with a smaller place than what you would get in the suburbs. And it often times makes even less sense to buy. Okay? I don't really see how disposing of our earthly possessions would solve any of the problems I brought up in the post you quoted, but thanks.
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Dec 6, 2011 21:39
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man thats gross posted:Okay? I don't really see how disposing of our earthly possessions would solve any of the problems I brought up in the post you quoted, but thanks. I hate to be blindingly obvious, but if you want to live in a major metropolitan area you pay substantially more, get less, and have to deal with the fact that in general, the more affordable places tend to be older, which means more problems. Or you find somewhere to rent you like, and do that.
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Dec 6, 2011 23:19
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cstine posted:I hate to be blindingly obvious, but if you want to live in a major metropolitan area you pay substantially more, get less, and have to deal with the fact that in general, the more affordable places tend to be older, which means more problems. If you want a yard and a garage in the city I'm guessing you're going to pay out the rear end. So change your requirements, budget, or location. There's no magic bag holding full of large lot homes steps from transit (note that these two are basically the opposite of each other) for a low low price.
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Dec 6, 2011 23:24
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PC LOAD LETTER posted:Except there are plenty of cheap homes without any issues that are move in ready on the market right now and they're getting cheaper all the time given home inventory, foreclosures, falling wages/benefits, still high unemployment, rising cost of living, etc. Walking into a house and going WOW THIS IS PERFECT I MUST HAVE IT NOW after an hour isn't what I'm talking about. The real estate market varies from city to city and neighborhood to neighborhood, so you can't really make generalizations about market trends. When you are looking for a house, there are many things you have to consider, price being only one of them. One home may be in a great neighborhood, but have an active termite infestation that could cost thousands of dollars to repair. Another may be in perfect condition, but require a very long commute to your place of work. Every one of these things adds or subtracts value to the home from your perspective, and that may be different from how other people value those things. A couple with no kids and no plans for kids won't care how good the schools are, while that is absolutely critical for a family with a special needs child. If, after careful research, you find a home that meets your unique needs very well, it may be worth more to you then it would to other people. In that case, paying more than appraised value may make sense, especially if the home has a combination of attributes that are very valuable to you and difficult to find.
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Dec 7, 2011 14:58
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Thanks guys. This really was more of a sanity-check than anything else. When you start seeing plywood shacks selling for $350,000, you start to wonder if you're basically The Greater Fool for even considering buying, or if that's just the name of the game.
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Dec 7, 2011 17:14
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How's this for a state of the market. The sellers of the house we put an offer on received 6 offers, of which they sent a counter offer to 4, including us. Let the bidding war begin. They also requested all contingincies be lifted after 17 days, which will be crazy trying to get FHA approval in that time frame especially since 17 days later will be Christmas. We countered leaving loan contingency at 30 days.
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Dec 7, 2011 18:32
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man thats gross posted:Thanks guys. This really was more of a sanity-check than anything else. When you start seeing plywood shacks selling for $350,000, you start to wonder if you're basically The Greater Fool for even considering buying, or if that's just the name of the game. In situations such as those aren't you mostly paying for the land itself, which in some cases would actually be worth more if the "plywood shack" was leveled?
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Dec 7, 2011 19:04
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ArterialTool posted:In situations such as those aren't you mostly paying for the land itself, which in some cases would actually be worth more if the "plywood shack" was leveled? Well, yeah, but we can barely afford the land, let alone the $150K-200K+ it would cost to demolish said shack and build a new home. Maybe I could run a profit if I bought a dump, leveled the property, and sold it, but I'm not so much interested in playing the real estate lotto as I am in finding a place to live.
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Dec 7, 2011 19:15
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jerkstore77 posted:How's this for a state of the market. The sellers of the house we put an offer on received 6 offers, of which they sent a counter offer to 4, including us. Let the bidding war begin. This is insane, considering that the average closing time is coming really close past 30 days.
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Dec 7, 2011 20:35
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man thats gross posted:Well, yeah, but we can barely afford the land, let alone the $150K-200K+ it would cost to demolish said shack and build a new home. Maybe I could run a profit if I bought a dump, leveled the property, and sold it, but I'm not so much interested in playing the real estate lotto as I am in finding a place to live. Yeah, demoing an old building and building something new would be more than $150-200k.
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Dec 7, 2011 20:43
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