I've touched on this subject before and since it keeps coming up regularly I feel a need to make some more comments. Buyers of real estate these days mostly want to feel like they are getting a good deal. A typical inquiry from a buyer will be something like "send me listings of the best deals on the beach with a nice ocean view, if I see something I like I'll fly down tomorrow." Unfortunately there just isn't that much low hanging fruit. If a property is priced significantly below market it is either undesirable, IE: it needs a lot of work, or gets snatched up rather quickly.
In another more common scenario a buyer will call me about one of my listings and ask "how low do you think they will go". For starters it is completely unethical to divulge that information and secondly I simply don't know the majority of the time. I have seen sellers walk away from offers when we were just a few thousand dollars apart and I've also seen my sellers accept offers I never would have imagined. Believe it or not a seller isn't going to tell me " lets list it for $400,000 but between you and me I'll take anything over $300,000. Sellers are rarely that candid even with their trusted agent.
If you go through the closed sales reports on my website site you can see that great deals aren't found they are made. Sales prices 10% below asking price are commonplace and some as much as an incredible 1/3 below asking. If you are a buyer these days and want a good deal you just simply must prepare to test the seller with a real offer, in writing with an earnest money deposit. You will waste a lot of time trying to find some mystical insider information, or tossing out verbal offers all over the place. With so few buyers today, money talks. If the equity is there and you demonstrate you are a serious buyer you can come out a winner.
Tom Day, Re/Max in Motion
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