Email ElizabethThe Hill On Which an Elk Grove Home Buyer Dies
On which hill is a buyer in Elk Grove willing to die upon? We all pick our battles, but the hill on which we choose to die is special. That’s a question I ask myself when I see an offer arrive for one of my sellers. Most home buyers and their agents are fairly agreeable upfront, but down the road once we’re in escrow things can change. If agents and buyers start out on the wrong foot, though, odds are that they will continue on that same path. This is what I warn sellers about. I tend to share pertinent stuff that happens.
I just closed an escrow yesterday in which we had previously lost a few buyers on the short sale due to no fault of the seller or my advice. Our short sale market in Sacramento has pretty much fallen flat, thank goodness, and it’s odd for me now to close a short sale versus the hundreds I used to list and sell. The first buyer was in contract for about 48 hours before that buyer freaked out and canceled. The next buyer canceled when Fannie Mae asked for another $5,000 in sales price. Finally, we secured a third buyer who was willing to pay the extra $5,000 and wait for approval. This was a smart buyer because by the time we received the approval letter, the property was worth more than that $5,000 increase.
That second buyer had decided to die over $5,000. Now, there is nothing available in that complex anywhere near the price that buyer could have paid to own a property. The sales prices are higher.
In another escrow, we received a full price offer from an Elk Grove buyer who wanted to use her own title and escrow company, even though she wasn’t paying for those services. We pointed that out and sent her a counter. This buyer demanded her own title and escrow, regardless, most likely at the suggestion of her agent and argued ad nauseam over the issue. That was the hill on which that buyer chose to die.
It’s good the sellers passed on that buyer because the thing is a few days later another set of buyers much more willing to work with the sellers came along and wrote a spectacular offer that the sellers could not refuse. This is exactly what I shared with my sellers would happen. Nobody says you have to take an offer that makes you uncomfortable, and a REALTOR needs to look out for the best interests of the seller. Sometimes, that means saying no to an offer and letting the Elk Grove buyer die on that hill.
The WX Freeway and FIX50 Project Make Google Maps Your Friend
Staying “in the know” about Sacramento and Sacramento real estate is my primary focus from day to day, so it’s not so odd, I suspect, that I was unaware of other things. I learn new things every day. I enjoy learning new things. It also means if I’m capable of absorbing new information, I’m still a long ways from keeling over. The funny part is I am often astonished when I learn some new unrelated-to-real-estate-fact that I should have known. Like, did you know Liz Claiborne is dead and she died from cancer 7 years ago?
I bet you do know that. The other thing I didn’t realize is her line of clothing had bought Kate Spade & Company. I know Kate Spade as a New York bag designer who married the comedic lame brother of B-grade-movie fame, but I’m kinda shocked that Kate Spade was acquired by Liz Claiborne and even more now that the Liz Claiborne brand is sold at J.C. Penney. All of which I probably would have realized had I continued to thumb through fashion magazines after I turned 40. But no, I instead read real estate magazines.
There are only so many hours in the day.
Which is why I have had to morph into the Google map expert to help my clients get around Sacramento with the W X freeway and FIX50 traffic mess we are embarking upon. My world is Sacramento real estate. Because I list homes all over Sacramento and our neighboring counties such as El Dorado, Placer and Yolo, I am a regular WX freeway driver. With my schedule, the biggest problem I have faced is whether to head out from Land Park on Highway 50 or Business 80, and sometimes I admit to driving out the wrong freeway if I’m yakking on my cellphone bluetooth.
Fortunately, I have a WX freeway hover car. All I have to do is press that hover button on my dash, and my car sprouts wings and fire sprays from the tailpipe. I immediately rise above the line of traffic and can promptly plop my car into the fast line on the appropriate freeway. So, no problem if I make a mistake. For other people, though, it’s a huge problem, and there are more of them ahead if they don’t preplan their driving route in Sacramento.
Hello Google my old friend. I’ve come to talk with you again.
Can We Still Keep Looking After We Buy a Home in Sacramento?
Your homebuying days should come to a close when you’ve found a home to buy — which should put a stop to such questions as can we still keep looking after we buy a home in Sacramento? But it doesn’t. Buyers in Sacramento still ask those types of questions. They don’t know. I call it the red shoes syndrome for first-time home buyers. The question nags at them as to whether there is a better home that maybe they just didn’t have a chance to see.
The thing is there will always be a chance to buy a home Sacramento. Maybe not today and maybe not tomorrow. Maybe next year a home will come on the market that might have better suited a buyer’s fancy, but should they wait? That would be a year without a home. The problem is they want the perfect home, and there really is no such thing as a perfect home. There is the grass looking greener on the other side, though.
Home buyers will be much happier if they review their reasons for buying a home in Sacramento. Then consider what kind of trade-offs they will make to find the home of their dreams. Maybe the dining room will be smaller than they had hoped, but if everything else fits their requirements, it’s possible that they should probably buy that home. Especially if it’s in the right location because you can’t move locations.
Homes also tend to have voices, whether a buyer realizes it. From the moment buyers step into a home, they form an impression, but it’s malleable. It can get better or it can worsen. Buyers should not have to talk themselves into wanting to buy a home in Sacramento. It’s much simpler than that. They either want it or they don’t. If they want that home, then the very best thing they can do for themselves is to buy it and stop looking. To continue looking is fruitless and leads to disappointment.
It’s called making a decision. If you “sleep on” trying to decide, it’s possible that you don’t really want the home because you’re taking a risk that you could lose it.
Are You Really Prequalified to Buy a Home?
Just because a buyer is holding a preapproval letter from a lender, it does not mean that buyer is prequalified to buy a home in Sacramento. Of course, the buyer does not understand that because, after all, the lender issued the letter, what could possibly be wrong with it? I don’t have enough time in the day to talk about how many things could be wrong with that preapproval letter, but I’ll tell you this, no seller wants to find out in underwriting that a particular problem exists that should have been discovered before the darn approval letter was issued in the first place.
If you think these kinds of thing don’t happen, then you don’t work in Sacramento real estate. Faulty preapproval letters are almost becoming the norm. Each one is different, so a seller needs to read the letter to figure out if the lender even has a loan application from the borrower. The lender might not. The lender is not required to obtain a loan application in person prior to issuing a prequal letter.
We are presently working with a very sweet couple who hope to buy their first home soon. Like most first-time home buyers, they are filled with the excitement and a little bit of stress over finding a home. The home buying process is very new to them, and they aren’t sure where to start, but they knew enough to go to their local credit union and a major bank to get a loan pre approval letter before calling me.
Hot off the presses from the credit union, that pre approval letter was their ticket to viewing homes — because it meant they could finally write an offer if they fell in love with a home. The major bank was issuing the preapproval letter as well, although it seemed to be delayed by a few days. It takes only a few hours to get a preapproval letter from our preferred mortgage brokers.
Just to compare rates and service, we suggested the buyers call Dan Tharp at Guild Mortgage. He handled the refinance for my home a long time ago, and I’ve referred Dan Tharp for years. Honest, ethical, hardworking, devoted to the mortgage business and extremely smart. He verified the buyers and guess what? They are not pre-approved. The credit union made a big mistake. The buyers verified this with the credit union as well. They didn’t just take Dan’s word for it, although they could have. Because now Dan is helping them to fix that roadblock, and they will be back on the road to home ownership in no time at all.
Just because you are holding a pre-approval letter, it does not mean you are actually pre-approved. Not even if it comes from the biggest credit union in California.
There is a Buyer for Every Sacramento Home
In the mind of this Sacramento real estate agent, there are no bad homes to sell in Sacramento because there is a buyer for every Sacramento home. I have learned this the hard way over decades, and I’m sharing you the pain of wondering if your home will sell because it will. You just need the right buyer for it. There is a buyer for every home. Even homes that are in the wrong location or have some other sort of defect.
Now, an experienced real estate agent will figure out from the get-go who that buyer is and target that buyer. You don’t need 20 buyers for your home, and you don’t need 15 multiple offers. A seller needs that one buyer who wants the home and will close escrow at terms agreeable to both parties. It really is that simple. There is no need to complicate the situation.
For example, last week I listed a couple of homes that are very different from each other. One home is close to the Foothill Farms neighborhood, near Madison. The sellers were concerned that they needed to rip out the carpeting and replace it. They also were thinking about pulling off the wall the entire tub and shower combination and installing new. A cabinet drawer was not seated properly in the kitchen. That drawer was a concern for the sellers. I made my suggestions, which were minimal and probably not what I imagine the sellers were expecting to hear. I helped them to locate a couple contractors.
I also correctly identified who the buyer would be and, sure enough, that’s exactly who we are in escrow with today. I described that person to a T. That’s who bought it, too. And this is not a person I personally know, in case you’re wondering. This is what experience brings to my sellers. They can pay the same for a new agent as for an experienced agent, and experience tends to provide better results.
The other home was an astonishing disaster. Not at all what I had been expecting or what the sellers had imagined. They hadn’t seen the home in 25 years. It was, for lack of a better phrase, a shambles. But have no fear, there is a buyer for this kind of home, too. That buyer is a flipper, a person who will try to negotiate the lowest price possible to maximize future potential profit. I know the kind of buyer we’re dealing with, and we have a few of those buyers right now vying for this home. The right one will buy it. Because there is a buyer for every home.
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