Showing posts with label over priced listings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label over priced listings. Show all posts

Sunday, November 22, 2015

Home Buyers Frustration in a tight market is a real conundrum

Home Buyer frustration is real and frustrating for both the buyer and the buyers Realtor. 
Most people look for a deal, always have and always will. With the advent of online shopping its made it crazy easy for one to shop multiple outlets using your lap top in the comfort of your home to find the best price for the product one wants. Now while shopping for a home is very different in many ways home buyers still want the same result, a deal. No matter when or how tight the market is the majority of buyers, high 99%  CRINGE, HAVE ALLERGIC REACTION, to making an offer at full or above list price. Why? Easy, buyers have been conditioned to NEVER PAY FULL PRICE and worse NEVER PAY MORE THEN FULL PRICE. That's because we all believe that Negotiation is a normal part of the buying process, or is supposed to be.
In a normalized balanced market, when there are enough homes to satisfy buyers,  price negotiation would  be considered as normal. However when there are more homes for sale then there are buyers, its a buyers market and very ripe for serious price negotiation favoring the buyer. We saw this buyers market after the housing crash in 2008 and depending on location continued into 2013-14.  If your seeing rising home prices in your market then it would seem safe to say its turned or is turning into a sellers market, favoring the seller more so than the buyer. As a result NEGOTIATION of price is not a tactic that will work for the buyer, trying will just frustrate the buyer. In fact if the home in consideration was priced right and or in good condition it will sell quickly so the question will then become which contract offer will the seller accept. OUCH! 
So what is a buyer in a sellers market to do? To start accept the reality of your local real estate market and prepare yourself. You have to know what you want in a home, be very specific. Know what you have to have, what you would like to have and what you can do without. This is important because you cant have it all, there has to be some trade offs so its important for you to address this upfront. Then you have to determine when you want to take possession, where you want to move to, how much you want to spend, if you will finance the purchase know precisely what you qualify for and what you can afford  because there is a very big difference.
Then ask yourself the following: If you find a home you really like the meets your preferred criteria are you prepared to immediately make an offer, possibly above list price? If your not then IMO you shouldn't bother to even be looking because your not ready to deal with the reality of your market.
What should a Realtor be doing with a buyer in a sellers market? See the above, read it, internalize it and unless you need the practice I wouldn't be taking any buyer out that hasn't proven to you in one way or another that they are ready, willing and able to immediately act!  
Unless both parties ( buyer and Realtor) are honest with each other, any attempt of their working together will be an EFFORT IN FUTILITY