Buying A Home
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Copy from GP - Home Buying Question
I posted this on GP but also wanted to ask here.
H
and I just saw a house that we LOVE. It's the first one where I didn't
think, 'Wow, I only have to put up with this for 5 years and then I can
run'. And the only house that H and I both said we LOVED and were ready
to pack to move in. It however, is at the top of our budget. Could we
do it? Yes, but we don't want to eat ramen for the rest of our lives
(over-exaggerating, but you get the idea
) For those of you who have bought your homes, or those who were on
the selling side, is there a certain dollar amount or percentage of
asking price at which you would not consider an offer serious? We are
thinking of going in about $15,000 under asking price and negotiating
from there. We would love to buy it for $10,000 under asking but with
seller assist and a provision for additional monies to be used to bring a
fire door up to code, and get laundry appliances. Are we totally
insane for thinking that is possible? We are first time home buyers and
are very new to the negotiations so please let me know what you think??
There is a good chance we will be writing our offer over the weekend
and I don't want to get in and have zero idea of where to go. Should we
start out lower than $15,000 below? Closer to $10,000 below? Ideas,
thoughts, and questions welcome! Thank you!!
Re: Copy from GP - Home Buying Question
TTC Countdown to 8/2015
TTC Countdown to 8/2015
This is a very market- and property-specific thing. In our market, houses are selling for 98.5% of asking price (so says redfin). Since the typical list price is right around $650, and knowing that houses will usually sell for about 1.5% less than list (so sale price of $640, a $10k "discount"), offering $15k less than asking price is typically within reason. But if a seller already listed at $640, the amount they expect to get, and someone comes in $15k under at $625, that low offer is probably going to be a non-starter. And if the house was listed at $625 to start with and has only been on the market for a few days, that seller listed low to start a bidding war, and the low-ball bid will get tossed directly into the trash.
The best thing to do is sit with your Realtor, look at recent comparable sales, and develop an offer strategy that is specific to that house in that market. Good luck!
We're currently buying a house right now (first time buyers as well) and we asked $5,000 under the asking price. We live in a LCOL area so $5,000 could be comparable to the $15,000 you're thinking about. However, we didn't initially ask for any seller's concessions and only a few contingencies. We're now getting $1,000 credit at closing (issue with the attic) and all of the appliances were included. Our relator has bascially held our hand through all of this and has been awesome at helping us with the negotiations and our initial offer. We're at the top of what we wanted to spend but the taxes where we're buying are ridiculously low (in a high tax area of the country) so that's what helped us to decide to buy at the top of our price point.
After that usually negotiations can reduce the price by 10K or close to 10K.
I think you are asking a lot - and doubt they will provide $ for you to buy new laundry washer and dryer --- perhaps buying their used one for a small amount seems more possible.
If you are not working with a realtor - find one (not the listing agent) - it will cost you nothing (paid for by the seller) and they can help you with this.
@Sisugal - There are no laundry appliances currently because it is a flip and is vacant. We'd be on our own there but working with our realtor has shown us that it's probably best not to ask for it.
We are headed back on Sunday with the now-knowledge of another couple being interested in the house. We have put our max for the house at $4K below asking price with 3% seller assist. We're hoping for closer to $10K below asking with 6% seller, but for us to get this house, I would work the extra OT and cut back on our extras.
Here's to hoping!