[quote=patb]
Um Let’s see how many errors I can find here
[/quote]
Yes, let’s.
[quote=patb]
1) Houses aren’t like used cars. Yeah, My 12 year old Camry is paid for. If i had a mortgage,
I’d still be paying.
[/quote]
That appears to be an agreement.
I am not sure how the comparison constitutes a mistake.
Glad to see you agree with Ren.
[quote=patb]
1b) Houses are sold based upon payment. Very few
people figure out $/SF, Estimated depreciation, Maintenance budget, Hell most people don’t know
what PITI means.
[/quote]
Houses are sold upon a variety of factors.
As your statement confusedly illustrates (they know payment but not PITI?!?!), many people are pretty seriously uninformed. I would venture to say that this is less true now than it was 5 years ago. However, that is anecdotal and I have been wrong before when estimating the skill of civilians.
[quote=patb]
1c) Houses are sold emotionally. How many people
look at the “Curb Appeal”, me I want an ugly duck.
I’ll fix it up. My house in Oklahoma was Fugly
when we bought it, 5 years later, it was gorgeous.
[/quote]
You are not particularly unique either in your interests or in your bragging. Lots of people look for beaters and declare themselves immune to curb appeal. Looking for a particular cocktail of price, upkeep, and upgrades is pretty normal. It may or may not be rational.
Recently, a friend’s sister asked me to find her a house in a specific neighborhood. The one we got for $405,000 was turnkey and lovely. However, the one a block a way was about $120k less and was a model match. The difference was that the cheaper one needed about $35k of work and had not been updated since it was built 55 years ago. For her that was uninteresting. She and her husband have 3 kids and precisely zero interest in fixing or improving anything. With 3 kids, they wanted to move right away.
The point here is that these decisions are based on more than just affective emotion. Often, they are based on rational (or irrational) decision making that reflects different priorities.
[quote=patb]
2) People can’t be talked into buying a house
they don’t want? Woah, dude, there are a
million salespeople who’se livelihood is
based upon your denial.
[/quote]While I try to never underestimate the stupidity of humanity, I think that the drawn out nature of a real estate purchase (combined with the major market adjustments of the last couple of years) tends to limit truly snap decision making. I have had clients cancel purchases when they sat down and realized that the property they had just gotten under contract would not work for them. That’s why it pays to have a 30 or 45 day escrow and to go back and look a few times. Most people who end up in a bad situation are pissed off that they paid too much or got a bad loan rather than the property itself.
[quote=patb]
3) Any reasonably intelligent person can see
manipulation? Wow. You realize people voted
for George Bush. The average person is an idiot.
50% of all Americans are below average.[/quote]
On this issue you are totally right.
