Don’t let a low ball put you behind the eight ball
January 3rd, 2008 - Categories: Selling a home in the Dothan area
By: Charles Woodall
http://www.dothanhomesearch.com
I was over at my brother’s house just before Christmas helping put a trampoline together for my niece. His neighbor, who has her house on the market, came over to check out what we were doing. Without knowing me or what business I am in, she starts talking about a recent offer that was presented to her by her agent. From what I was able to put together, the offer was not just lower, it was substantially lower (a ?low ball? in real estate vernacular) than her list price, so she instructed her agent to reject the offer outright, and admonished her “friend” the agent for bringing her something so ridiculous. She basically blamed her agent for the low offer.
I haven’t done a market analysis on this particular house, and I haven’t been inside of it to know what condition it is in. I do know that the current list price does not at first glance look to be far out of line. So why did she get such a low offer? Simple economics. There were three sales in this area of Dothan in the last three months, and there are currently six houses for sale in the same area. Why wouldn’t a buyer, with ample supply to choose from, look for a bargain?
I never let on to this lady that I was in the real estate business, as she wasn’t really talking to me anyway. There will be a time and place for that. My unsolicited advice would be to never outright reject any offer. At a minimum, make a counter offer at or near full price to determine the motivation of the buyer. You just might be suprised when you find out that really want this house above the other five, and they would have bought with just a little negotiation.
What is a seller to do to combat these low offers? We’ve talked about it before here, here, and here. It never hurts to go back and re-read. Let us know your experience with low offers by commenting below!