When to Cut Bait with Buyers
The absorption rate in the Tulsa area is continuing to drop. We have been moving towards a seller's maket in Tulsa for the past year. Once we hit a six-month supply of houses on the market, we will no longer be in a buyer's market.
Sellers are getting it. They have been watching their home prices rise in Tulsa over the past year. They are holding out and waiting.
Sellers are watching their home values increase and it's taking less time to sell. Even the luxury properties are moving.
It's especially a seller's market in midtown Tulsa, if the house is priced correctly.
There are also fewer horse properties, equestrian estates, farms and ranches available for sale in Northeast Oklahoma, especially in the affordable price ranges with less than 20 acres.
With the drought, we are seeing more and more cattlemen from Texas and New Mexico coming in to buy pasture. There really aren't that many bigger properties on the market in our area.
It's a great time to sell, because the buyers are out in force and they are scrambling.
If buyers aren't ready to go with pre-approval letters from local banks and / or proof of funds letters, then they are not serious about getting that perfect property when it becomes available.
Make sure your REALTOR insists on buyers being qualified to purchase the property before they come to look at it. Otherwise, they are wasting everybody's time. Insist on it.
Also, need I remind you that if you are looking to purchase land in Oklahoma, make sure you work with a REALTOR who understands land.
Buyers who dilly-dally make problems for themselves often.
Don’t get me wrong. I understand the search for the perfect house. This is where buyers will live, and they will pay for for quite some time.
I get it.
But, the perfect house doesn’t exist. Ask anyone who has built one, like me, for instance.
If buyers continue to hem and haw, if they have to bring every living relative along to approve the purchase and then start bringing the friends who know plumbing, electrical and construction, you have a problem.
And so do they. Every visit to a property lessens the negotiating power of a broker or agent to present a fair offer that is favorable to the buyers.
My strategy is to look at eight or ten properties and then find one UNLESS, none of those properties is optimal for the buyers. But, normally, out of ten properties in our area, one will be what they are searching for in price, condition and location.
Playing a waiting game in this market will guarantee you will lose….nearly any property that has interest. Other buyers are searching, too. Some of them will make offers at or above list price to get what they find to be a “good buy.”
Don’t be a tire kicker. If the seller believes that the buyers are interested, the seller might be more interested in a quick but fair offer rather than another offer. The more days on market generally means a lower net for them in the long run, too.
Take the reins, buyers. This is no longer a buyers’ market.
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