We took out buyers to a beautiful home the other day....everything about it was what they loved...from the paint colors to the room layout...then there was the matter of the price. They COULD pay at or near asking.... after careful review with their financial planner, they decided it was just not a part of their financial plan at this point in time. Researching the history of the property...the price was apparently in no other buyer's plans either....at various prices...the home has been on the market a total of 741 days. We have had sellers sell and buyer short and traditional sales get to the closing table with less than what everyone believed the house was "worth"...but there was a closing and a relief to the sellers....and buyers who could take advantage of the price,
In that light, I e-mailed the listing agent and told them our buyers liked the house but were willing to pay $X, did not want to insult the sellers....just a thought to float. World's most arrogant reply fired back (this agent has only had the listing 30 days....he is lister number 4....who listed it at the former agent's expired price.)
"I can assure you the sellers are not interested in an offer of $X...they have refused higher offers. If your buyers can pay that much in cash, the payment would be $X for financing an additional $X. (Gee thanks, my calculator was broken....)
A quick look at recently scheduled sheriff's sales....Oh Oh....Agent $X....it looks like part of your expired list is now on the Sheriff's docket....whoops...maybe your sellers would have been interested in a lower price if you had explained the options of a short sale and foreclosure....
Do we always know the sellers real selling motivation ? Can we speak without consulting them....after over 2 years on the market....Whether a buyer CAN pay $X is the same is not different than whether a seller will accept $X...it is one willing party to another....and who are agents to decide how willing and when enough may be enough...enough to take a less than optimum price...we are not.
Sally, I think the arrogance is directly tied to the desperation of the agent and we are seeing more and more desperate agents these days.
I am looking at this very differently. Maybe the seller's agent DOES know the seller's motiviation and IS qualified to speak for him. I am more curious about Sally showing a house not within the buyers fianancial sphere. Shouldn't the looking happen after financial planners have been met with? Or at the very least doesn't Sally owe her buyers the courtesy of having a conversaiton with the list agent at the front end and ascertain whether they are wasting everybody's time?? Seems to me we are forgetting about mutual respect of buyers and sellers and time. Not everyone is in the pre-foreclosure, short sale, bankruptcy world.
If you are going to be critical Tanya...identify yourself....and know all the facts..... The buyers ARE qualified to spend six fugures BEYOND the price...ability to spend and willingness to spend are not the same thing...we never take an unqualified or not pre-qualifed bjuuyer to any showing..You are forgetting the mutual respect of agents in the Rain....without knowing all the facts....and revealing your identity. Of course not everyone is in foreclosure...and of course no one knows if they are willing to spend money on a hosue they CAN afford until AFTER they have seen it...he other very importnat element of this story you are not looking at...is that this agent has a history of taking a number of sellers into foreclosure with over pricing for too long...had the home been priced "at the market" when it was listed, the sellers would not have gone into foreclosure. We don't always agree with everything...you should know the facts....as we did BEFORE we took the buyers to the house..
I did identify myself; my name is Tanya and I am a licensed realtor in the state of OR. I am not in the Rain (yet, was considering joining you all but now I am not so sure), not a rainmaker or any of the like. Just happened upon your blog and had a few thoughts.
I am sorry I offended you. I thought Blogs were for intellectual debate. I didn't realize it was only for the purpose of getting people to support your stance. As to identifying things, perhaps your situation could be looked at more objectively if you didn't have so many anonymous items in IT...the $X and Agent $X make it all very hard to follow. You secondary post mentions something about six figures; makes me wonder how much you were trying to steal this home for below list. And really makes me wonder how list relates to value.
And you wrote:
"he other very importnat element of this story you are not looking at...is that this agent has a history of taking a number of sellers into foreclosure with over pricing for too long...had the home been priced "at the market" when it was listed, the sellers would not have gone into foreclosure."
I obvioulsy have no way of knowing about agent $X's history, but by the original post I didn't realize this house had ended up in foreclosure. Not a lot of any of this makes sense to me. Sorry.
Sally, you didn't do anything I wouldn't have done. On the other side of the table, I have a listing where the seller has told me she will NOT go below $xxx, and she turned down a cash offer of just $5000 below $xxx. I tell EVERYONE who calls to show the house that the price is firm, she turned down a lower cash offer, and to keep that in mind as they decide whether or not they present an offer. Some would debate whether or not that is in the best interest of the seller. I had that debate with myself. Wouldn't it be better for my seller if we let people present lower offers so we could have a starting point for negotiations and hopefully get them up to something she could love with? Yes. However, she has approved me giving the disclaimer, and I have decided to do it so as not to WASTE EVERYONE'S TIME. the showing agents truly appreciate knowing upfront that an offer lower than full price is futile.
Now, back to your phone call to Agent $X. If I were the listing agent, I would not have taken offense to that phone call from one of my professional peers. And even if I KNEW that my client would not be interested in the verbal offer, I would have thanked the agent and told her that I didn't think they would accept it based on our past experiences, but I would run it past them and get back to her. Then I would have called my clients, discussed the merits, and called that agent back, thanked her for the offer and wished her all the best in finding a home for her clients.
THAT'S how professionals behave in the real estate business when they are acting in the best interest of their clients.
Nothing is worth more than someone is willing to pay for it.
The point is that financial investments...just as real estate situations and prices change....not to advance a verbal offer...or discuss is not a service to the seller...We too have had the "I am not taking less than..." conversations...then we look at the ongoing taxes, payments, etc....If you don't get an offer for 60-90 days, it will cost $X
Tanya....in comments...everyone makes assumptions...you assumed we were in the wrong to show someone something they could not afford...not the case...and no one can know what investments they are willing to shift, if they want a mortgage, cash out or sell something for a house they have nevr seen. Internet tours are one thing...being there is something else. The Rain can be a great learning tool...best to question rather than accuse...The financial planner to be accurate would have to know everything about a specific home to advise them...property taxes are a huge five figure consideration that cab sway a financial picture and that will vary with each home.
This is interesting. We used it at our weekly sales meeting this morning...lots of input and notes.
Jay: your comment that nothing is worth more than someone is willing to pay for it was mostly agreed to understanding there could be many "someone's" with different ideas. In other words person A could offer 200K, person B could offer 240K and person 3 could offer 300K...each is worth to them what they are willing to pay for. Based on that we slightly amended it to be True Value is achieved when both the buyer and seller agree on a price.
And Janna to your point about Sally and David's phone call to Agent$X. This point I entirely missed; it wasn't a phone call afterall. They indicated they emailed the seller's agent. Based on that we have no way of even knowing if Agent $X DID or DID NOT run this whole thing by the seller. That was a big part of discussion but an even bigger discussion erupted in our meeting about the proper use of email. It was felt by the group perhaps this would have had a better outcome if Sally or David picked up the phone and called Agent $X instead of emailing.
And the last point we discuseed was what ever happened to salesmanship? If this home is everything the buyers have been dreaming of, shouldn't they really be coached on that topic and coached on value and how to determine it. Obviously we don't have those details to draw any conclusion. But we all know the whole world does not revolve around price alone. Without knowing any of the applicable numbers we couldn't really consider this conversation like we would have liked to...how about it Sally and David....care to enlighten us all with the facts. It would help us all become even better salespeople which is all we really want.
I appreciate your detailed analysis...and again I did not fill in every detail....I also left the agent voice mail which they almost never respond to....they do to e-mail...for this agent, it is the best way....
The buyers have purchased at least a dozen homes and own several...they don't need coaching...they had to analyze with their investment counselor what happened if they cashed in this,. did that...that is not a decision for a realtor....The world DOES revolve largely on price and what it does to a lifestyle if you spend $X rather than invest it...the tax consequences, tax payments, deductions...coaching no...knowing what you don't know and that sophisticated buyers have advisors in a better position to advise them than we are...This is a short blog...not a detailed description of everything that happened...If you would like to talk...please call...or write directly to our e-mail...This is a conversation better answered one to one...I can't anticipate your questions and you don't know all the details...I know agent X...he did not run any numbers passed the buyer..he did not and does not answer the phone...there are lots of things we know from doing business over years with the same agents....
I appreciate your detailed analysis...and again I did not fill in every detail....I also left the agent voice mail which they almost never respond to....they do to e-mail...for this agent, it is the best way....
The buyers have purchased at least a dozen homes and own several...they don't need coaching...they had to analyze with their investment counselor what happened if they cashed in this,. did that...that is not a decision for a realtor....The world DOES revolve largely on price and what it does to a lifestyle if you spend $X rather than invest it...the tax consequences, tax payments, deductions...coaching no...knowing what you don't know and that sophisticated buyers have advisors in a better position to advise them than we are...This is a short blog...not a detailed description of everything that happened...If you would like to talk...please call...or write directly to our e-mail...This is a conversation better answered one to one...I can't anticipate your questions and you don't know all the details...I know agent X...he did not run any numbers passed the buyer..he did not and does not answer the phone...there are lots of things we know from doing business over years with the same agents....
Whoops...missed yours Robert...these are the most ethical buyers on earth...it was all they wanted...their choice was to make some compromises on how much travel they did and their lifestiyle or put it in a house...no one was stealing...they had to find out at this point in time, if they did this...what would that do to their financial picture....They are detailed in their fact gathering and spending over half a million and a considrable amount on property taxes is a huge consideration. As to the price and offer...as a buyer's agent, the offer would have been more than fair...we know the area and had run the numbers before seeing it...and afterward reviewed them....You are wrong about the seller not being distaught....ask anyone who does short sales here....I can think of 3 that were sellers hanging on for years...and they just get further upside down...Does time on market matter is it sometimes...yes sometimes...an indication of upside down....yes it is....hope against market....time on market matters lots...in lots of ways,.
As a point of clarification ...SOME sellers are upside down and hang on to prices...this blog does not say THIS seller is upside down. Referencing phone calls that were not returned...it was our past experience with this agent...when he showed a property of ours, four calls were not returned...e-mail was answered so we elected to use that as a communication method.