Why As Is?
My client was looking to buy a house and the type of financing that she would use would require that the house which she purchased was basically safe, sound, secure, and livable. To meet this condition, some "as is" conditions, which were not perfect about the house would probably be okay.
Her affordability was $100,000 or less.
There was some reluctance to look at houses which advertised that they were being sold "As Is" simply because of her financing, however there were a limited number of houses so we did look at a few that we thought might be acceptable in spite of being sold as is.
As an example of why I question selling a house "As Is", I present this comparison of two houses, which we saw, where one was listed "As Is" and the other was not. The houses were located relatively close to each other and on the same street. Neither house was a distress sale.
The As Is house was priced at $87,000, while the other house was priced at $99,000. They were relatively similar, except that the As Is house had a finished basement, while the other house had no basement.
Even without the trained eye of a home inspector, it was obvious that each house would need some things to be addressed, however, nothing seemed that it would be very expensive.
My buyer opted for the more expensive house. A deal was negotiated which with price and closing help concessions, brought the sellers net down by about $6,000. A home inspection was done, which, indeed, did uncover some issues, all of which probably did not add up to more than $1,000. This was, also, a good price for the area, where some similar houses were selling for about $120,000.
Meanwhile, the other house was reduced in price from $87,000 to $79,000. This did not bother my buyer, who was still satisfied with her purchase.
In summary, the one sellers house, which did not have an "As Is" restriction was sold. When considering, the price reduction, closing assistance, and repairs, the net to the seller was about $7,000 less than where they had listed it, or about $92,000.
The other house is still on the market and has already reduced its price by $8,000 down to $79,000.
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