is agent playing games

[ZachAnSel]

more delays...

Just told by the agent that vendor will drop the asking price by $20k and will have another open this weekend.

I guess that means my offer is not good enough AND there's not enough people interested in the house....

The house has been on market for 2 months.

What I usually do.

Request contract of sale from REA, I always able to find the vendor names & address.
Do the reverse address to get the vendor phone number, this is easy stuff using white pages.

Write down your formal offer with term, condition & expiry date - send via email, register post, etc. Then call vendor and advise them if you already put formal offer to agent, don't forget to mention that this special offer only apply until xx-xx-xxxx. I always end up with sentence "better hurry, because I have another interest in property A,B,C". You can mention A,B,C depends on stock on the market on the same street/suburb.

Base on my experience 95%, REA/Vendor will back sooner than later.. Now its up to you to negotiate the deal after they counter/accept.

Good luck with your house finding..

 

[tgan]

Don't mean to hijack, but I am in a similar situation at the moment, only
the talking is being done by a ba that I very recently took on.
Have come across a property that stacks up, but agent seems to be ignoring ba's
request. Its been very confusing, because I thought ba's would know how to get around agents and subsequently secure property that average joe may not. Anyway, this has been going on for a week! Just found out that it wasn't even put in writing! urgh!!!
Anyway, (maybe I should ditch the ba!, but that should be another thread), but I am going to insist offer is resubmitted in writing and with a deadline!
Moral of the story....put it in writing with your conditions and a deadline so that you can get on with life.
good luck!

 

[Big Will]

I work as a REA and I do not do verbal offers or even email offers.

If you have an offer you put it on the contract of sale and it will be presented ASAP. Usually within 24 hours.

This protects all parties involved, let me explain:

1. The Purchaser
If you gave a verbal offer of $500,000 and the REA presented it and the Vendor agreed to it. The REA would then ask you to come in and put it on the contract of sale (CoS). It would then get written up and the REA would take it back to the vendor for them to sign... Now what if the vendor goes hmm actually we no longer want $500,000 we want $520,000. Would you be annoyed? There is no legal binding document that says the vendor has to sell it to you at $500,000 so now your choice is pay the $520,000 or more on.

2. The Vendor
Same story but when the purchaser came in to sign $500,000 the buyer goes actually I only want to pay $480,000. Now what is the REA meant to do?

3. The REA
Having the offer on the CoS as soon as everyone agrees it is signed then and will form a legally binding document. This means no one can change anything without the other party agreeing and the sale is done so the REA can claim commission.

REA can and I know of some who use verbal offers to 'condition' the vendors. This is done by saying we have a verbal off of $450,000, a week later another offer of $460,000. Vendor says "We will not accept anything less than $480,000. I have a verbal offer of $470,000, the vendors think long and hard about it and finally say okay if that is the best then sign it up. Next day the buyer isn't going ahead because of whatever reason (finance usually or the spouse doesn't want the property). How is the vendor meant to know if the person was a real purchaser and not the REA making it up. Also some people just like to see what the lowest price the vendor will take just to fish and get the price down.

So for the 102nd time there is no verbal offers in real estate.

 

[MrPeanuts]

thanks for the replies, especially to Big Will.

Now as I mentioned before: wrote up the contract of sales on last Sat and gave it to the agent.

Agent came back on Sun saying the vendor wants more (quite annoyed that agent didn't get the vendor to cross out my offer in the contract)

I thought he's playing some game here; as I have spent my effort putting this my offer in writing and he just wanted to counter me on the phone!!!

What's going on here?

After a day or two, I requested him to counter my offer in writing (on the contract). He said he will speak to the vendor. Then I got a call saying someone jumped in wanting to pay the full price.

This house has been on market for 2 months and no one except me has been offering (i know) and suddenly someone jumps in???

BTW the house will open this coming sat.

 

[cimbom]

Tell them to accept the other offer

 

[MrPeanuts]

so true, cimbom.

What I don't get is why this agent prefers to talk instead of writing it down.

I thought their job is to make a sale happen. Unless there's something wrong like: the vendor/agent doesn't like me

 

[cimbom]

I'm not sure if the reason is really important. Just give them a deadline and say that your offer will be withdrawn after that time as you are looking at other properties. Then following through with what you say, don't call/email them and look for something else. Otherwise they will just continue to play games with you.