East County SD v St George for gzz’s budget McMansion lifestyle

[an]

[quote=teaboy][quote=an]If you are willing to walk away from a deal because of 1%,then either you can’t afford it or you didn’t really want it.[/quote]

If you’d pay 1% more, then why not 2% more? If you’d pay 2% more, then why not 3% more, etc, etc, etc…

At some point you need to assess your BATNA, or draw a line somewhere, however arbitrary it may seem.

So, I reject your hypotheses, an & sdrealtor!

Amirite?
tb

and congrats on sealing the deal, gzz.[/quote]
2% is 100% more than 1%. You’re right, we all have our own line and those lines tend to reflect how much we want the thing we wanted to buy. For a $2m house, 1% is $20k. With a 30 years mortgage, that’s $666/year more or ~$55/month. If you’re will to walk away from a $2m deal because of an additional $55/month, then either you didn’t really want it to begin with (or at least not enough to pay $55/month more) or you already were stretched to the brink and can’t afford $55/month more. BTW, $55/month is cheaper than my internet bill.

[sdrealtor]

[quote=teaboy][quote=an]If you are willing to walk away from a deal because of 1%,then either you can’t afford it or you didn’t really want it.[/quote]

If you’d pay 1% more, then why not 2% more? If you’d pay 2% more, then why not 3% more, etc, etc, etc…

At some point you need to assess your BATNA, or draw a line somewhere, however arbitrary it may seem.

So, I reject your hypotheses, an & sdrealtor!

Amirite?
tb

and congrats on sealing the deal, gzz.[/quote]

You are missing the point. There is a difference between 1,2 and 3 % but coming here and bragging about his negotiation just says two things. He doesn’t really love the house and feeling like a winner is more important than getting the right house for his family. I’ve done this before many times. 50/50 he ends up walking away.

[Coronita]

.

[teaboy]

Am I missing the point? I dont get why that is.

If you’re willing to pay $2M for a thingamabob, then 1% more is $2.02M. By your theory you’d thus be somewhat stingy not to be willing to pay $2.02M for it.
So, now you’d be willing to pay $2.02M for a thingamabob and, again, you’d thus be somewhat stingy not to be willing to pay $2.0402M for it.
So, now you’d be willing to $2.0402M for a thingamabob…

Who sets the base at $2M? You do. But that was only shortly after you realized you were willing to pay $1.980198M for that thingamabob…

tb

[scaredyclassic]

In the film THE USUAL SUSPECTS, when some bad guys threaten to kill another bad guys family in front of him, he responds by shooting his own family himself.

Now that’s negotiation.

There is great value in a strong position, even if not entirely rational.

[sdrealtor]

Its not a thingamabob. It’s a home for his family. Quite a difference. I’ve been doing this more than two decades and see it over and over. People don’t live in thingamabobs

[sdrealtor]

[quote=scaredyclassic]In the film THE USUAL SUSPECTS, when some bad guys threaten to kill another bad guys family in front of him, he responds by shooting his own family himself.

Now that’s negotiation.

There is great value in a strong position, even if not entirely rational.[/quote]

Keyser Soze

[an]

[quote=teaboy]Am I missing the point? I dont get why that is.

If you’re willing to pay $2M for a thingamabob, then 1% more is $2.02M. By your theory you’d thus be somewhat stingy not to be willing to pay $2.02M for it.
So, now you’d be willing to pay $2.02M for a thingamabob and, again, you’d thus be somewhat stingy not to be willing to pay $2.0402M for it.
So, now you’d be willing to $2.0402M for a thingamabob…

Who sets the base at $2M? You do. But that was only shortly after you realized you were willing to pay $1.980198M for that thingamabob…

tb[/quote]
I never used to word stingy. There’s a huge difference between being stingy and not caring for something enough to pay the extra 1% to close the deal.

As sdr said, you’re buying a home and not a thingamabob. There are intangible variables that goes into buying a home that doesn’t exist in most other thingamabobs.

For the same home $2m, one person would willing to pay 5% more because they really want it, while the other only want to pay 1% more, another might not want to pay any more than what was offered, and while another would not go over $1.9m for it. Worst yet, there might be someone who come in at $1.85m all cash and the seller pick that buyer.

As I said, assuming you can afford the deal, then you probably don’t care for the home all that much, so it’s OK to lose the deal because of the 1% difference.

I’ve walked away on plenty of deals when my offer price was not accepted and I also went up to where the seller is to close on the deals. It all comes down to how much I wanted the place.

[scaredyclassic]

There’s a really awful song from the 60s that sticks in my head, I heard it as a child. I think my parents may have taken me to a pete seeger concert…

somng’s called Little boxes…about real estate, conformity and general crappiness of society. it’s just an awful song, such an arrogant, elitist monstrosity of a song. Should have a parental advisory warning sticker on it.

The song would probably go with the theory that houses are thingamabobs. I think this song may have messed me up and caused me to rebel for no good reason. I despise this song.

the song is of course incredibly dated now; HOAs would prohibit different colored houses, and your kids can’t afford to live in the same ticky tacky box. ahh, the good old days back when it was ok to deride normal suburban existence.

Little boxes on the hillside
Little boxes made of ticky tacky
Little boxes on the hillside
Little boxes all the same
There’s a pink one and a green one
And a blue one and a yellow one
And they’re all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same
And the people in the houses
All went to the university
Where they were put in boxes
And they came out all the same
And there’s doctors and lawyers
And business executives
And they’re all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same
And they all play on the golf course
And drink their martinis dry
And they all have pretty children
And the children go to school
And the children go to summer camp
And then to the university
Where they are put in boxes
And they come out all the same
And the boys go into business
And marry and raise a family
In boxes made of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same
There’s a pink one and a green one
And a blue one and a yellow one
And they’re all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same

[XBoxBoy]

[quote=scaredyclassic]There’s a really awful song from the 60s that sticks in my head, I heard it as a child. I think my parents may have taken me to a pete seeger concert…

somng’s called Little boxes…about real estate, conformity and general crappiness of society. it’s just an awful song, such an arrogant, elitist monstrosity of a song. Should have a parental advisory warning sticker on it.
[/quote]

This was used as the theme song of the show “Weeds”! Loved the show, but yeah, the song is kinda arrogant.

[gzz]

Thank you flyer teaboy and scaredy for the kind words.

Teaboy’s comments show the fallacy of the “why not just pay 1% more if you really care.” The extra 1% can be repeated endlessly, something like Zeno’s paradoxes.

Yes, I would have walked over the 25k difference. Prices are falling in east county at least, and the type of big suburban homes I was targeting start losing some of their potential buyers as the school year approaches. If this were the only McMansion in San Diego under 2m, yes I would have paid the extra 25k. But that’s not the situation.

I might have come back to the same home, or found another, or just waited a couple months and reentered the market. The home was the best home for me on the market now and I really like it. But there was 1 home that sold in early June I wish I had grabbed that was better than the one I am buying, and maybe 2-3 more over the past 6 months that were about equal.

I negotiate litigation settlements all the time, so while I may not be an expert, nor am I noob. Suburban homes are a lot easier to value than most legal cases. For example, property sales are public record, but most settlements are confidential, so the pool of “recent comparable sales” in litigation may be small or oftentimes zero.

So far I am liking the jumbo loan process. While pretty close to conforming mortgage process, there seems to be less of a focus on checking Fannie Mae guideline boxes and more on just documenting the major income and assets. I also like that it will be serviced by the same big bank originating bank. I have had Wells and Chase service mortgages, and they are a lot more user friendly than tiny companies that right now have my three current mortgages. My processor also noted that if I choose to make a 15k+ extra payment, I can have my loan “recast” such that instead of an earlier payoff date, the minimum payment is recalculated lower. There have been times when that would have been great.

[gzz]

I enjoyed Weeds when it was initially airing, especially the seasons set in San Diego. Mary Louise Parker has such a great presence and Kevin Nealon is underrated.

This TV show was set and filmed in OB. It got good reviews, but the premise didn’t interest me and it only lasted one season.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terriers_(TV_series)

I remember them blocking off roads and the huge Hollywood sized film crews two blocks from my house.

[scaredyclassic]

[quote=gzz]Thank you flyer teaboy and scaredy for the kind words.

Teaboy’s comments show the fallacy of the “why not just pay 1% more if you really care.” The extra 1% can be repeated endlessly, something like Zeno’s paradoxes.

Yes, I would have walked over the 25k difference. Prices are falling in east county at least, and the type of big suburban homes I was targeting start losing some of their potential buyers as the school year approaches. If this were the only McMansion in San Diego under 2m, yes I would have paid the extra 25k. But that’s not the situation.

I might have come back to the same home, or found another, or just waited a couple months and reentered the market. The home was the best home for me on the market now and I really like it. But there was 1 home that sold in early June I wish I had grabbed that was better than the one I am buying, and maybe 2-3 more over the past 6 months that were about equal.

I negotiate litigation settlements all the time, so while I may not be an expert, nor am I noob. Suburban homes are a lot easier to value than most legal cases. For example, property sales are public record, but most settlements are confidential, so the pool of “recent comparable sales” in litigation may be small or oftentimes zero.

So far I am liking the jumbo loan process. While pretty close to conforming mortgage process, there seems to be less of a focus on checking Fannie Mae guideline boxes and more on just documenting the major income and assets. I also like that it will be serviced by the same big bank originating bank. I have had Wells and Chase service mortgages, and they are a lot more user friendly than tiny companies that right now have my three current mortgages. My processor also noted that if I choose to make a 15k+ extra payment, I can have my loan “recast” such that instead of an earlier payoff date, the minimum payment is recalculated lower. There have been times when that would have been great.[/quote]

Litigation settlements are about stories too.

[gzz]

Nothing a lawyer of a certain age likes more than telling “war stories.”

Here’s one from me. I was the lead lawyer in a case and won at the Ninth Circuit. The other side sought en banc review and was immediately rejected. Then sought Supreme Court review, which was granted.

While I wanted to again argue the case, the issue being reviewed was a narrow and technical one, and an attorney who had won a similar case before the Supreme Court offered to do it very cheaply. So I owed it to my clients to step aside.

We then lost 0-9, with Sotomayor writing a unanimous decision.

I could have done it, it couldn’t get any worse than that.

In the end, it didn’t matter. Only a narrow slice of the Ninth Circuit’s decision was reversed. With the rest of it intact, we won before the trial court.

Today I learned by best prospect for another Supreme Court trip was cancelled. The 1986 decision Kelly v Robinson has been aggressively criticized by circuit courts, who suggested it may be bad law. The 9th Circuit called it a “relic of the 80s” like “big hair and NutraSweet”

In 2020, the SC appeared to be interested in revisiting it, but declined because one of the lawyers was a pro se bankrupt attorney coming off a suspended license. In my case, the other side was a competent big SD firm.

What dashed my dream was the other side decided not to defend Kelly at all. I think I would have won in the end, but they had plenty of good cases and arguments they could have cited.

[scaredyclassic]

[quote=gzz]Nothing a lawyer of a certain age likes more than telling “war stories.”

Here’s one from me. I was the lead lawyer in a case and won at the Ninth Circuit. The other side sought en banc review and was immediately rejected. Then sought Supreme Court review, which was granted.

While I wanted to again argue the case, the issue being reviewed was a narrow and technical one, and an attorney who had won a similar case before the Supreme Court offered to do it very cheaply. So I owed it to my clients to step aside.

We then lost 0-9, with Sotomayor writing a unanimous decision.

I could have done it, it couldn’t get any worse than that.

In the end, it didn’t matter. Only a narrow slice of the Ninth Circuit’s decision was reversed. With the rest of it intact, we won before the trial court.

Today I learned by best prospect for another Supreme Court trip was cancelled. The 1986 decision Kelly v Robinson has been aggressively criticized by circuit courts, who suggested it may be bad law. The 9th Circuit called it a “relic of the 80s” like “big hair and NutraSweet”

In 2020, the SC appeared to be interested in revisiting it, but declined because one of the lawyers was a pro se bankrupt attorney coming off a suspended license. In my case, the other side was a competent big SD firm.

What dashed my dream was the other side decided not to defend Kelly at all. I think I would have won in the end, but they had plenty of good cases and arguments they could have cited.[/quote]

Procedural stories are good. I also like the underlying human stories.

[Author]

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