Can You Put That in Writing

You Can Always Tell When An Offer is Not Coming

This post was prompted by Bill (still BLiz to me) Spear's Ask an Ambassador:  Ignoring the Bait post about not falling for the okey doke (aka bait).  It reminded me of some recent communications with an agent about one of my listings.  It appears that her buyer wanted to negotiate all of the terms without ever writing an offer.  Over a couple of days I'd get questions like "Will the seller accept X amount of dollars?"  Then there was "Is the seller providing a "termite service agreement?"(on a cash only $33k property mind you)

There really wasn't much I could say as I am not the seller and I can only speak to that which the seller and I had discussed and deemed okay to share. However, permission to share or not, if you want me to take your buyer seriously have them put an offer in writing.  (DISCLAIMER:  Hold up.  Hold up.  Before you even go there, I am fully aware that an offer does not have to be in writing, whereas the contract does have to be in writing).  But since an offer is more than just price, it only makes sense that a seller would want to review an offer in its entirety and not just bits and pieces of it.

I knew when an offer didn't arrive the following morning as promised, it was unlikely that it would ever arrive.  But the questions just kept coming.  I know that agents are under pressure from their buyer or seller to communicate in ways that we'd rather not, but as the agent, it's still up to us to advise on the best approach.  In this case, the best approach, rather than ask question after question about what the seller would or would not accept, let's quit with the "baiting" and put a formal (wirtten) offer on the table.  Otherwise it's all just a waste of everyone's time. Everyone except my seller that is because I NEVER tell my sellers that I'm expecting an offer or tell them that an agent says s/he's going to be submitting an offer.  Why don't I share?  Well because that's an offer that may never show up and it does nothing except get my clients' hopes up.

FORGET THE BAIT

Yeah as always Bliz, you are so right.  You get to decide which bait is worthy of exploring, but let's put our experience to work and don't second guess the writing that is clearly written on the wall in color, bold, italics and underlined.