THE ART OF NEGOTIATING A HOME SALE IS ALL ABOUT FINESSE. HOW MANY REAL ESTATE AGENTS ACTUALLY EMPLOY STRATEGY WHEN PREPARING AN OFFER?  truth be told, not many.

Todd Clark and I have posed the same question.

I can't tell you that? WHY NOT? Who does the listing agent really represent?

In Florida, there is nothing specific that bars an agent not to disclose an offer amount unless specifically instructed in writing by the seller to do so. An agent cannot disclose how much a buyer is willing to pay nor can they disclose how much a seller is willing to accept. 

BUT, HOW MANY AGENTS ARE ACTUALLY DISCUSSING SCENARIOS WITH THEIR CLIENTS?

 Not many.

Up until recently, agents were just hoping and praying for an offer to come in at all.  But, lately, it is by far more common to receive multiple offers on a well priced property, particularly in REO and short sale listings where the list price is designed to attract multiple offers because it is set under market value deliberately.   As a result, there are several strategies which are effective and utterly ineffective in play on any given listing.

Some of which have already been mentioned here and are valid to a point. Having said that I will add that  THE GOAL is to achieve  a meeting of the minds.  One of the ways this is accomplished in a buyers market is to be honest with CO-OPERATING  brokers and to give them the opportunity to present strong offers which will meet or exceed the sellers expectations. 

Asking them to present an offer without any idea of where they need to be, in order to be successful in that attempt, may not produce the best offer for the seller.

The object is to eliminate inferior offers, and narrow down the field to viable offers which will accomplish the sellers objective and which fit into the buyers buying ability.

While it is not a game- certainly at times it can feel like one-there are several tactics employed by both buyers and sellers in the art of negotiating.

 Those agents fearful of only obtaining a thousand dollar incremental increase may in the end inadvertently lose an offer substantially higher because all negotiations involve a certain amount of finesse.   Let me repeat that in case you missed it... ALL NEGOTIATIONS INVOLVE A CERTAIN AMOUNT OF FINESSE.

You must study your market-

Know what has sold and for how much over the past 30 days,  

Extrapolate the percentage  at or over asking price from that data

Determine what a  reasonable  Selling Price is likely to be. 

 For example, in the chart above, I used Poinciana, Florida,( a distressed area) commanding multiple offers on almost every short sale, REO and foreclosure property, the average over a 30 day period showed that

SUCCESSFUL BIDS  were 12-18% ABOVE asking price. 

 Sellers Agents who would not disclose the new high bid price range- often received inferior offers. Ultimately frustrating Buyers Agents, and Buyers who relied on nothing more than a guess. Ones who did disclose a ball park figure received higher quality offers yielding a greater dollar amount for their clients.

Buyer Agents who do as I suggest will have a greater probability of submitting an offer which is acceptable and conforming to the price their buyer is willing to pay, and what the market is likely to yield.

In the end it is a win/win for both parties to the transaction.       

You've got to know when to hold them and know when to fold them!