I tend to save mobile numbers of local agents I ever speak to in Western Sydney. We had been looking for a development site last year for months. Exactly knew what we wanted. On a fine morning in late August 2013, we decided that since market was moving fast, we'd buy any house in given the market was rising. Got ready to leave home around 8:55am...about to leave home to go see two houses in areas we weren't as keen on. Even got contracts for the two of them. Both were decent but apparently had a bit of interest. So I was about to go get ready...Mum was again looking at RE and came across a new listing in the area we wanted to buy in (the search didn't specify the area even, it was listed as a surrounding area search). There was no address on the ad. The agency don't put agent name, mobile numbers and only do privately booked open homes. I had never met the one approachable agent in the agency (other than the owner). So we called the office and got the address...Checked the LEP, checked the frontage etc...turned out to be 23m frontage, 734sqm land, duplex site.
I called the agent that I hadn't met ever...just had his number saved! And he happened to ring me back (despite a busy morning). I asked him if I could buy it on the phone. He said it wouldn't be fair to others who had booked time to see the property at 1pm that day. I was lamenting that the agent we did know at this agency had resigned. That other agent was really cool! So we got to the property and knew we wanted it. Waited a while. The agent was late. Turned out the agent who had left the business had been called to help them for the day! And there he was..we had a long good chat. The actual listing agent showed up. There were two other buyers to view the property. So we were the first ones through. We said to the agent we wanted it so he told us to go to his office and that he will show others as well and then come to his office.
He showed up around 15 minutes later. We went in and eventually decided on a price around $6,550 more than the asking price. The agent wondered if we were ready with all doco (legal) as it was a trust purchase. He took my licence and looked at the address which was Mount Druitt (first home purchase was in Mounty) and was a bit confused how we could buy this property given the "address" on the licence. Then he asked us how we came up with the trust name. We told him the trust name came from our humble beginnings and was the name of the complex where we first bought in late 2009. Also told him where we had gotten and how having moved to Australia 13 years ago we had decided that we were going to be good landlords. He was incredibly impressed and said it was hats off to us for shaping our life the way we had. Btw, we also signed a piece of paper that it was our best offer. Anyway, the conversation ended. He promised us he wasn't going to coach the other buyers waiting to sign the contracts.
We came home by 2pm or so. Waited till 6pm for agent's call. He said, that our offer wasn't the highest. It got me quite down. But he went on to add that he had told the vendors that we knew what we were doing. The vendors asked who he'd go with and he said he'd go with us.....
We were stoked. Never been happier about a purchase, we had done so much homework for
. Apparently the other offer was $3,500 higher than ours! But the buyer started um'ing and ah'ing when he was asked about the finance.
The moral is, never double guess yourself infront of an agent..especially about finance. Btw, we had no pre-approval as we rarely do given we want to minimise credit hits.
The property is in EXCELLENT location. As per draft LEP in R3 zoning. But we can build detatched duplexes. The house is 800m from station, 900m to westfields, 500m to local shops and school, 1km to hospital, close to major roads etc.
The irony is, number 3 has featured a lot in all our purchases. This property is house number 3, the land size is divisible by 3, the price was divisible by 3. Superstitious I know...but it's true. Since we've been a bit more specific in our purchases. The next we purchased is not number 3, but we ensured the price we paid was divisible by 3.
P.S. We keep in touch with the agent now. When we first purchased from him, we caught up for lunch to say thank you for his integrity in the whole process. He knows the area inside out and is happy to go door knocking when we were wanted to do another purchase. I tried to help someone I knew to buy a listing of his. But to convince agents, you need to be really sure about what you want, do your homework and only communicate when you want to buy. No tyre kicking!
P.s.s. The property is worth 14% - 20% more than what we paid last August.