[raptorduck]

I never realized why I like certain styles of homes and why I just love inner courtyards. Thank you.

[raptorduck]

SDR and others, thanks for your insights.

First off, I don’t want to imply that all RE agents are crooked etc. Lawyers and stock brokers get picked on, but most are honest. I don’t know that any RE agents are crooked.

But perhaps because I have toured so many houses and considered offers more than the average # of times, I have seen a few “outliers.” Most of my friends who buy houses tour 2, 3, or even 4 and buy one. They don’t tour hundreds. Both my agents have told me I am “not” the average buyer. The average buyer does not tour over 100 homes before they buy. I am the same with cars and women. That is just me.

The first time I bought a house 7 yrs ago, I toured 60+ homes and made 17 written offers in a major seller’s market. Towards the end, before I bought my house, I had an experience that opened my eyes to the problem with my assumption that all selling and buying agents play fair and honestly.

I wanted to put in a bid on a house I liked. The selling agent was not very nice nor cooperative, but we, and over a dozen other people, put in our bids. I did not get the house. After the sale, my agent found out that the selling agent also represented the buyer. Now it was a closed/blind/sealed bidding situation, or whatever it is called, so we did not know how to place our bid to ensure that we got it. But of course the selling agent knew everybody’s bid. So one buyer had an agent who knew everybody else’s bid and the other dozen or so folks were playing blind. When escrow closed the house sold for exactly $50k more than my own bid. Go figure.

To show you how green I was as a first time buyer, and ignorant/clueless, the house I bought was staged. I did not realize that. I had never heard of staging before. Staging really works people. Look at me.

Anyway, that “dual agency relationship” opened my eyes to my ignorance and assumptions on fair play. So this time around, I started a little more mindful that things I or my agent are being told by selling agents may be not quite true. Whether we call it negotiation tactics or dishonesty does not matter. As SDR says “so what.” I am informed enough now to be looking out for such things. I think particulalry in a market like this, where RE agents need to pay their own mortgages, there is more pressure to sell and do whatever it takes to generate interest. My view is that the ways these agents I described went about it had the opposite impact they desired.

SDR. It is not that I am being emotional by walking away if I detect any other third party interest and are not willing to get into a bidding war. In this market, I don’t have to. In fact, this time, I have taken my emotions out of the equation. I have written my “10 commandments of home buying” and no matter how much I love a house, I am sticking to them. That way, I don’t get caught up in my own blind emotions and think rationally in an emotional situation with the help of a rule book.

The first time I bought, every house had multiple bids and if you did not write an above asking non-contingency cash offer with 3 months free rent back from the get go, you were out of luck. This was early 2000 in the bay area. In some markets, like Los Altos (which I gave up on back then), many homes had 30 bids and a few were selling for twice asking. I had no choice, but to either compete for a home, or rent and sit it out. People here would have said rent, and they would have been right. 4 yrs later, the market had dropped quite a bit and I was under water in my San Jose house I paid $100k over asking for to get. I am back above water now, even in this market, but would have been better off buying stocks (wait, that is not true, I would have lost even more on that one, I bought just before the stock crash . . . I mean correction).

In this market I just don’t have to compete. I think you touched on this. Of the homes I “considered” an offer on, I really only loved 2 (the electronics one and the stretch one). In those cases, no matter how much I loved them, I was turned off by the selling agent’s comments. The first was outright bad conduct IMHO. The second, well she told my agent they had that all cash no contingency offer richchex just referred to earlier. To be honest, on that particular house, I could not afford to compete even if I wanted to. It was at the absolute top of my range at low asking. But I like to think I would have still walked. Why get into a bidding war in a buyer’s market? Seller’s market sure, but buyer’s market?

Of course, as you indicated SDR, if I like the house I should not let a rule get in my way. You are right. But only 2 fit that bill so far, not the others I listed. That one house with 10 offers was not going to be my house. It was going to be an investment. It was tiny and not what I was looking for. It was for sale 3 doors from one I was looking at. We walked over saw the price and immediately started talking offer. The sole one I actually wrote an offer on was a tear down on a magnificant lot/neighborhood.

Either way, I think I will take your advice and write an offer if I like the house enough. If another higher offer comes in (whether true or not) I don’t have to respond by upping mine. I can just (i) say to the selling agent “please consider mine a back up offer” or (ii) withdraw and tell the agent “please call my agent if it falls out of escrow.” But I will not compete. Not in this market.

Have you ever noticed on eBay with multiple auctions of the same exact item? One has 15 bids and another that closes just 1 hr later for the same item has 0 bids. People feel that if there is competition for something, it must be worth the extra price to get it. I am the guy who waits the extra hr and puts in 1 bid and pays the lower price for the same item.

Ok, homes are not identical (well unless you live in my neighborhood of 5 interiors, 4 exteriors, and 4 exterior colors). But with 200+ homes for sale in RSF, I have enough choices to ensure I don’t pay more than I should.

I did find my dream house down there, but it was that last one and even with her, I refused to play outside my self induced comfort zone. Indeed what you described is exactly what I observed. The house was on the market 4 months the first time I decided I wanted to write an offer. No offers had come in. When we said we wanted to write one, suddenly there was a cash offer. We walked and 2 more months went by. What happened to that other offer, it never went into escrow. So we were going to try again. Again, suddenly 2 offers were comming in that day. Again we walked. Again those other two never materialized. Just weeks later my agent took another client through that house as a favor for another agent and boom, no offers pending. Now, it seems to have actually sold.

Yes, on that one, I should have just written my offer and let it sit. Next time, if I find that dream house, I will take your good advice SDR and write a formal offer. Anything short of that dream house, however, as soon as I detect the game, I won’t play. I just dunt wanna.

If there are real offers on the table fine, but if there are none, selling agents should not mislead. Why drive away buyers? In a market like this, buyers will be less patient with things like that and will walk, because they can. And after all the words I have written on this thread, this was the point of my original tome of a post.

Apologies for my diarea of the keyboard.

[raptorduck]

SDR and others, thanks for your insights.

First off, I don’t want to imply that all RE agents are crooked etc. Lawyers and stock brokers get picked on, but most are honest. I don’t know that any RE agents are crooked.

But perhaps because I have toured so many houses and considered offers more than the average # of times, I have seen a few “outliers.” Most of my friends who buy houses tour 2, 3, or even 4 and buy one. They don’t tour hundreds. Both my agents have told me I am “not” the average buyer. The average buyer does not tour over 100 homes before they buy. I am the same with cars and women. That is just me.

The first time I bought a house 7 yrs ago, I toured 60+ homes and made 17 written offers in a major seller’s market. Towards the end, before I bought my house, I had an experience that opened my eyes to the problem with my assumption that all selling and buying agents play fair and honestly.

I wanted to put in a bid on a house I liked. The selling agent was not very nice nor cooperative, but we, and over a dozen other people, put in our bids. I did not get the house. After the sale, my agent found out that the selling agent also represented the buyer. Now it was a closed/blind/sealed bidding situation, or whatever it is called, so we did not know how to place our bid to ensure that we got it. But of course the selling agent knew everybody’s bid. So one buyer had an agent who knew everybody else’s bid and the other dozen or so folks were playing blind. When escrow closed the house sold for exactly $50k more than my own bid. Go figure.

To show you how green I was as a first time buyer, and ignorant/clueless, the house I bought was staged. I did not realize that. I had never heard of staging before. Staging really works people. Look at me.

Anyway, that “dual agency relationship” opened my eyes to my ignorance and assumptions on fair play. So this time around, I started a little more mindful that things I or my agent are being told by selling agents may be not quite true. Whether we call it negotiation tactics or dishonesty does not matter. As SDR says “so what.” I am informed enough now to be looking out for such things. I think particulalry in a market like this, where RE agents need to pay their own mortgages, there is more pressure to sell and do whatever it takes to generate interest. My view is that the ways these agents I described went about it had the opposite impact they desired.

SDR. It is not that I am being emotional by walking away if I detect any other third party interest and are not willing to get into a bidding war. In this market, I don’t have to. In fact, this time, I have taken my emotions out of the equation. I have written my “10 commandments of home buying” and no matter how much I love a house, I am sticking to them. That way, I don’t get caught up in my own blind emotions and think rationally in an emotional situation with the help of a rule book.

The first time I bought, every house had multiple bids and if you did not write an above asking non-contingency cash offer with 3 months free rent back from the get go, you were out of luck. This was early 2000 in the bay area. In some markets, like Los Altos (which I gave up on back then), many homes had 30 bids and a few were selling for twice asking. I had no choice, but to either compete for a home, or rent and sit it out. People here would have said rent, and they would have been right. 4 yrs later, the market had dropped quite a bit and I was under water in my San Jose house I paid $100k over asking for to get. I am back above water now, even in this market, but would have been better off buying stocks (wait, that is not true, I would have lost even more on that one, I bought just before the stock crash . . . I mean correction).

In this market I just don’t have to compete. I think you touched on this. Of the homes I “considered” an offer on, I really only loved 2 (the electronics one and the stretch one). In those cases, no matter how much I loved them, I was turned off by the selling agent’s comments. The first was outright bad conduct IMHO. The second, well she told my agent they had that all cash no contingency offer richchex just referred to earlier. To be honest, on that particular house, I could not afford to compete even if I wanted to. It was at the absolute top of my range at low asking. But I like to think I would have still walked. Why get into a bidding war in a buyer’s market? Seller’s market sure, but buyer’s market?

Of course, as you indicated SDR, if I like the house I should not let a rule get in my way. You are right. But only 2 fit that bill so far, not the others I listed. That one house with 10 offers was not going to be my house. It was going to be an investment. It was tiny and not what I was looking for. It was for sale 3 doors from one I was looking at. We walked over saw the price and immediately started talking offer. The sole one I actually wrote an offer on was a tear down on a magnificant lot/neighborhood.

Either way, I think I will take your advice and write an offer if I like the house enough. If another higher offer comes in (whether true or not) I don’t have to respond by upping mine. I can just (i) say to the selling agent “please consider mine a back up offer” or (ii) withdraw and tell the agent “please call my agent if it falls out of escrow.” But I will not compete. Not in this market.

Have you ever noticed on eBay with multiple auctions of the same exact item? One has 15 bids and another that closes just 1 hr later for the same item has 0 bids. People feel that if there is competition for something, it must be worth the extra price to get it. I am the guy who waits the extra hr and puts in 1 bid and pays the lower price for the same item.

Ok, homes are not identical (well unless you live in my neighborhood of 5 interiors, 4 exteriors, and 4 exterior colors). But with 200+ homes for sale in RSF, I have enough choices to ensure I don’t pay more than I should.

I did find my dream house down there, but it was that last one and even with her, I refused to play outside my self induced comfort zone. Indeed what you described is exactly what I observed. The house was on the market 4 months the first time I decided I wanted to write an offer. No offers had come in. When we said we wanted to write one, suddenly there was a cash offer. We walked and 2 more months went by. What happened to that other offer, it never went into escrow. So we were going to try again. Again, suddenly 2 offers were comming in that day. Again we walked. Again those other two never materialized. Just weeks later my agent took another client through that house as a favor for another agent and boom, no offers pending. Now, it seems to have actually sold.

Yes, on that one, I should have just written my offer and let it sit. Next time, if I find that dream house, I will take your good advice SDR and write a formal offer. Anything short of that dream house, however, as soon as I detect the game, I won’t play. I just dunt wanna.

If there are real offers on the table fine, but if there are none, selling agents should not mislead. Why drive away buyers? In a market like this, buyers will be less patient with things like that and will walk, because they can. And after all the words I have written on this thread, this was the point of my original tome of a post.

Apologies for my diarea of the keyboard.

[raptorduck]

Santaluz seems to me to be the most overpriced area from looking at homes there. I figure with new development still going on there, the housing crises, mello roos, and comps in RSF, comprably sized and finished homes in Santaluz with their much smaller usable back yards to boot are way over priced. I like many of the homes, but wont even consider an offer with the asking prices so much higher than what I think the homes I have looked at are worth. The numbers just do not justify it.

[raptorduck]

Santaluz seems to me to be the most overpriced area from looking at homes there. I figure with new development still going on there, the housing crises, mello roos, and comps in RSF, comprably sized and finished homes in Santaluz with their much smaller usable back yards to boot are way over priced. I like many of the homes, but wont even consider an offer with the asking prices so much higher than what I think the homes I have looked at are worth. The numbers just do not justify it.

[raptorduck]

First off I have worked with two realtors, one here, and one down there. Both are female. Second, the 100+ homes is Bay Area and SD. My examples were from houses up here and in SD.

For the record, on my 3 weekend trips to SD to look at homes, I drove on two of the occasions. Quite honestly, I also picked a less experiencd realtor knowning she would have to tolerate my patience in actually buying and selectivity on what I want. I figured her hunger for a commission higher than she is used to would motivate her. It has. I won’t knock on her. She is doing a great job for her experience level. Any ingorant moves, decisions, observations are strictly my own. I think she is doing the best job she can to advise me. I have nothing negative to say about her, I knew what I was getting and can’t say the same for her. She is sticking with me after 45 SD homes viewed to date. At some point she will get a six figure commission as a result. We work together. I find homes on the net and send them to her or vice versa and we decide whether to view them. It is a partnership that is working for me. I am not a passive client, I act as her partner as an involved client. And after the effort she has put in, I will not reward her by changing agents. I sought her out, found her and contacted her. I knew what I was doing. I will not blame her for things that are, in the end, up to me. I will stick with her until I buy or until she tires of me.

The point of my post was that the selling agents “scared” me away “before” I could write an offer. Yes, that is a product of my little rules. But once I detect some game playing or arrogance I just don’t want to play anymore. I don’t have to. Maybe it is because the last time I bought a house I acted desperate and uninformed and overpaid as a consequence. This time I am lucky, I can take 2 years to find the right house with no difficulty. If I find one tommorrow at the right price I will buy it. I thought I did a couple times, but you saw what happened.

To me the most blatent and obvious case of selling agent stupidity was the house with the electronics. The rest are what they are and I can only speculate what really went on. I did not write actual offers, so will never know. My fault, but I am ok with that. In the case where I did write an offer, we never got to terms. That is bidness.

In the short time I have been on this board, I have learned a lot from you all. You know my situation and what I am doing. I have been reading other on-line info and gathering stats etc about my desired markets. My goal is not to be a brilliant home buyer this time around. It is to be a less stupid one than the last time.

[raptorduck]

First off I have worked with two realtors, one here, and one down there. Both are female. Second, the 100+ homes is Bay Area and SD. My examples were from houses up here and in SD.

For the record, on my 3 weekend trips to SD to look at homes, I drove on two of the occasions. Quite honestly, I also picked a less experiencd realtor knowning she would have to tolerate my patience in actually buying and selectivity on what I want. I figured her hunger for a commission higher than she is used to would motivate her. It has. I won’t knock on her. She is doing a great job for her experience level. Any ingorant moves, decisions, observations are strictly my own. I think she is doing the best job she can to advise me. I have nothing negative to say about her, I knew what I was getting and can’t say the same for her. She is sticking with me after 45 SD homes viewed to date. At some point she will get a six figure commission as a result. We work together. I find homes on the net and send them to her or vice versa and we decide whether to view them. It is a partnership that is working for me. I am not a passive client, I act as her partner as an involved client. And after the effort she has put in, I will not reward her by changing agents. I sought her out, found her and contacted her. I knew what I was doing. I will not blame her for things that are, in the end, up to me. I will stick with her until I buy or until she tires of me.

The point of my post was that the selling agents “scared” me away “before” I could write an offer. Yes, that is a product of my little rules. But once I detect some game playing or arrogance I just don’t want to play anymore. I don’t have to. Maybe it is because the last time I bought a house I acted desperate and uninformed and overpaid as a consequence. This time I am lucky, I can take 2 years to find the right house with no difficulty. If I find one tommorrow at the right price I will buy it. I thought I did a couple times, but you saw what happened.

To me the most blatent and obvious case of selling agent stupidity was the house with the electronics. The rest are what they are and I can only speculate what really went on. I did not write actual offers, so will never know. My fault, but I am ok with that. In the case where I did write an offer, we never got to terms. That is bidness.

In the short time I have been on this board, I have learned a lot from you all. You know my situation and what I am doing. I have been reading other on-line info and gathering stats etc about my desired markets. My goal is not to be a brilliant home buyer this time around. It is to be a less stupid one than the last time.

[raptorduck]

When writing an offer, I mean a low ball offer. The point earlier on offers helping push up prices and creating a bidding situation I agree with. That is why one of my rules is to immediately withdraw if another offer is comming in. Or that was one of my rules.

What I think now is that it would have been good to write a low ball offer anyway, if that is what my offer really was. If another offer is really in, they will just ignore mine and it should not push the price up. If they were bluffing, they have mine on the table and even if they reject it, at least they know have a better idea of what the market will offer for the house. At some point, as would have happened in the cases I described, the seller will see that my offer was actually the best one they had, after it is too late of course.

Either way. I have a price I am willing to pay for each house and I stick to it. Where that falls compared to the asking price or what the seller is willing to accept I can not control, so to speak.

If I find the house I want listing at the price I am willing to pay for it, I will pay asking. If I think it is slightly under priced, I will pay above asking to get it. I did that once, or tried to anyway. But once the seller wants more than I am willing to pay, I need not play games, I just move on. With this kind of inventory, I can afford to.

[raptorduck]

When writing an offer, I mean a low ball offer. The point earlier on offers helping push up prices and creating a bidding situation I agree with. That is why one of my rules is to immediately withdraw if another offer is comming in. Or that was one of my rules.

What I think now is that it would have been good to write a low ball offer anyway, if that is what my offer really was. If another offer is really in, they will just ignore mine and it should not push the price up. If they were bluffing, they have mine on the table and even if they reject it, at least they know have a better idea of what the market will offer for the house. At some point, as would have happened in the cases I described, the seller will see that my offer was actually the best one they had, after it is too late of course.

Either way. I have a price I am willing to pay for each house and I stick to it. Where that falls compared to the asking price or what the seller is willing to accept I can not control, so to speak.

If I find the house I want listing at the price I am willing to pay for it, I will pay asking. If I think it is slightly under priced, I will pay above asking to get it. I did that once, or tried to anyway. But once the seller wants more than I am willing to pay, I need not play games, I just move on. With this kind of inventory, I can afford to.

[raptorduck]

I think it is good advice to write an offer anyway. I will be firmer about that. I note that I often hear agents say that if you want to write a low ball offer, it my upset the seller too much so you should test the waters first. I don’t think this was such good advice as I once did. We all learn and I am still learning how to do this buying thing.

Some of these sellers though, 100, 200, 300 days on market and not a single price drop. I figure if you let your house be for sale that long, you are rich and don’t need the money anyway and it is probably your vaction home anyway.

[raptorduck]

I think it is good advice to write an offer anyway. I will be firmer about that. I note that I often hear agents say that if you want to write a low ball offer, it my upset the seller too much so you should test the waters first. I don’t think this was such good advice as I once did. We all learn and I am still learning how to do this buying thing.

Some of these sellers though, 100, 200, 300 days on market and not a single price drop. I figure if you let your house be for sale that long, you are rich and don’t need the money anyway and it is probably your vaction home anyway.

[raptorduck]

Raybyrnes. I think in a couple cases the seller was probably driving the firm response, but in others I think it was their agent. In either case, I think the agent is supposed to be the more sophisticated real estate wise and less emotional so should counsel their client. It is obvoius that later they did indeed drop their prices dramatically.

In a few cases we indicated verbally while we were still looking at the house that we would be writing an offer and were discouraged as indicted in my post by the selling agent. In others my agent contacted the selling agent by phone after we viewed the house to ask if there were other offers and that we wanted to write one and was discouraged as indicated. She would either say we wanted to write an offer or we were considering writing one. Either way, not a good idea to discourage any interest in this market me thinks.

[raptorduck]

Raybyrnes. I think in a couple cases the seller was probably driving the firm response, but in others I think it was their agent. In either case, I think the agent is supposed to be the more sophisticated real estate wise and less emotional so should counsel their client. It is obvoius that later they did indeed drop their prices dramatically.

In a few cases we indicated verbally while we were still looking at the house that we would be writing an offer and were discouraged as indicted in my post by the selling agent. In others my agent contacted the selling agent by phone after we viewed the house to ask if there were other offers and that we wanted to write one and was discouraged as indicated. She would either say we wanted to write an offer or we were considering writing one. Either way, not a good idea to discourage any interest in this market me thinks.

[raptorduck]

I note that I only wrote an actual offer once. The other times we indicated we wanted to write an offer. That was when we got the responses we did. Still, I think the selling agents should have let us or encouraged us to write an offer. Seller could always reject it.

I also note that while I started looking this year as a far more savy buyer than when I bought my first house 8 years ago in a seller’s market where I overpaid by $100k, and while I am even far more savy (or less ignorant) now than when I started earlier this year, I still consider myself a less than sophisticated buyer.

[raptorduck]

I note that I only wrote an actual offer once. The other times we indicated we wanted to write an offer. That was when we got the responses we did. Still, I think the selling agents should have let us or encouraged us to write an offer. Seller could always reject it.

I also note that while I started looking this year as a far more savy buyer than when I bought my first house 8 years ago in a seller’s market where I overpaid by $100k, and while I am even far more savy (or less ignorant) now than when I started earlier this year, I still consider myself a less than sophisticated buyer.

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