How Much Should I Offer?As a Realtor in Long Beach, NY, I am constantly asked the same question. The question that I am asked by buyers, whether it is for a home, condo, co-op or townhouse, is how low should I make my first offer. I understand that buyers are bombarded by the media and they feel that they should make extremely low offers. Of course this makes a lot of sense in a buyers market to the buyer, but I frequently see people lose a property that they truly wanted because they were looking to steal a property.
My solution to this issue is that I try to explain to my buyers and sellers that pricing a property at market value yields the best results. Let's look at it in these terms. If seller A is very motivated to sell a co-op in say 55 Monroe Blvd and prices it aggressively at say $250,000. Now take seller B who is equally motivated to sell and he prices his co-op in Long Beach at $289,000. Seller B explains that he is expecting low offers and his solution is the higher price. For this example we have to assume at the two co-ops are exactly alike as far as location, view and condition.
What I feel is that that seller A will sell his co-op faster and for a better price in this buyers market for the one simple reason and that is exposure. By overpricing, seller B chased away all of the potential buyers by pricing his co-op out of the search range of buyers. Seller A attracted the most amount of buyers to his co-op and probably received multiple offers.
My point is that the internet gives both buyers and sellers so much information about market conditions, prices of properties sold and prices of properties on the market that they should be able to come to a fairly accurate idea of where the property should sell for. Of course the help of an agent who is an expert in this area will save you a great deal of time and make your home buying experience stress free.
According to the latest figures from Multiple Listing Service of Long Island, the average price difference on sold properties was 6.4% from the latest list price. This is just an average and does not mean that you should offer 6.4% less than the asking. After seeing a number of properties you will find the unit you love and the worse thing that can happen is to miss the opportunity.
Below are a few links to my website that you might enjoy. My favorite and most popular are what I call Hot Properties. These are the properties in Long Beach, NY that I feel are priced right and will probably sell the quickest.
Click here to see my Hot Properties
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