Thursday's Thought - Thank You For Your Honesty

We have a short sale listing that is a two family home that suffered burst pipes (NOT the one pictured here).  There is extensive water damage throughout the house and it is truly a gut and rebuild type of project.  That being said we get a LOT of calls on the property.  We've also shown it a LOT of times.  Almost always, the prospective buyer will say "It needs too much work" or "I thought I could live in one unit while I fixed the other one up."

No.  This house is NOT habitable.  Sorry.

So after a few showings, we're very up front with prospective buyers.  Today whilst in the office, I got a call on house.  I explained the condition of the home and she said: "we're looking for a fixer-upper."  I reiterated that this not a "fixer-upper" that this is a total rehab, in fact it might be better to tear it down and rebuild from scratch.  Then the woman said: "I'll tell my husband about it, but thank you for your honesty!  You've really saved us a lot of wasted time."

I let her know that I was happy to do so.  I also let her know that if they are serious about buying a home that we'd be happy to help them.  You see, it's better to let people know right up front if there's an issue.  With this home, it's hard to miss, but with some other properties a defect may not be so apparent.  So always tell the truth when dealing with  any buyer, seller or other agent.  I suppose that last sentence didn't need the words: when dealing with  any buyer, seller or other agent.