My husband and I are trying to figure out the best way to approach this. Even our agent says it's a unique situation that he hasn't dealt with yet.
We only started searching for a new home a few months ago. We are not investors and plan on living in our next house for 10+ years. We ending up finding the "perfect" home for our current/future needs, which includes some land and nice outbuilding that my husband loves. It's a unique property so there aren't many comparable homes in the area to get an idea if it's priced correctly. The listing price is $875k. The two homes in the area that are similar both sold around $720k about a year ago.
After researching the home, we found the current owners have a bridge loan and we estimated their bank gave an appraisal of $875k four months prior. The sellers only confirmed this number after multiple counteroffers. We eventually went under contract with an $875k cash offer contingent on our own appraisal and inspection. Our appraiser came back at $790k.
We talked it over and submitted a final counteroffer at $835k, hoping they would be willing to meet in the middle. But they didn't budge from $875k. This final response to our counteroffer happened on Christmas Eve when we were dealing with family so we didn't have the opportunity to talk privately without our families interrupting. We ended up walking away, not sure if we made the right decision.
About a week later, we saw the house was under contract on a facebook post. Long story short, the buyer's agent had it scheduled to post based on our contract and forgot to take it down, so it really wasn't under contract. We originally got upset when we saw the post and talked even more about how much we loved the property and maybe we shouldn't have walked away.
So, we decided we want to approach the seller again with another offer. The home has been up for 3 months and hasn't had much interest I believe because of the price. The sellers seem dead set on getting the $875k that the bank appraised it for.
We talked about just coming back with the same offer as before $875k and contingent on inspection, but we think they'll just immediately say no. I read some posts where it's suggested that we offer more than our previous offer, but we're stretching it already at $875k.
Just looking for any advice on how to approach this.
Reapproach with another offer after walking
byu/zesty_illusion inRealEstate
Posted by zesty_illusion
3 Comments
You’re overthinking it, IMO.
Decide what you are willing to pay for the house. Who cares if the sellers are dead set on whatever number. The only number that matters is the one you are willing to pay.
You’ve had a while to think about it, and you’ve had a few months of house shopping that should inform your offer, based on the other houses you’ve seen in the area.
Just make the offer at 875k. Worst case they say no. Best case you get your dream property.
Take the emotions out of it (this was drilled in my head by my husband but didn’t truly hit until our home purchase fell through last month due to appraisal)
No one else is offering 875K. Why should you? Try 815K – it’s 25K over your appraisal.