I’ll take the wood floor, s/s appliances and carpet (unless it’s covering the wood!) I *think* my choice would cost me less as well. Woohoo!

And as you say, back to the original topic. Houses are not televisions. It’s very difficult to truly pit seller against seller when you’re talking about houses. Possibly you could try with a pair of developers, but even that would seem difficult.

Nothing wrong with trying to get the best price for things. I always do (kind of to a fault). For housing, my preferred strategy would be one property at a time.