Email Elizabeth3 Tips for Submitting a Purchase Offer to Buy a Home in Sacramento
Apart from the fact that this Sacramento real estate agent could probably write a book about how to submit a purchase offer, I don’t have that much time in my schedule this morning and nobody has offered to pay me for it. Yet, I would like to address 3 tips that would help a buyer’s agent to get an offer accepted. These are things that if any agent thought about it for a few minutes or looked at it from the viewpoint of a listing agent, they would automatically do. But many remarkable ideas are simple.
Before sending an offer, please review these simple tips:
- Send one PDF
- Don’t send disclosures
- Email in low resolution
There is no reason to send a bunch of different files. Let’s set aside the fact that by sending more than one PDF, a buyer’s agent is taking the chance that a PDF file might not end up as an attachment by oversight or a seller might not open it, and look at what a hassle it is from a receiving viewpoint. First, I have to set up a folder to accept all of the PDFs I receive from a buyer’s agent. I can’t just save the offer to my desktop nor dump the offer along with its supporting documents into the property folder because they will get lost and separated. All separate documents require their own stinkin’ folder. I hate to think what the seller does with the documents.
Second, then each of those PDFs have to be opened to be read. Some require separate applications to open. For example, if a preapproval letter arrives in a Word format, and I don’t happen to have Word open — because it’s not a program I use very often — then I need to sit and wait for Word to open. It’s annoying.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I am very excited to receive an offer for my seller. That is my job: to get a purchase offer. But let’s say it’s a seller’s market, like the market is today in Sacramento, and the seller might receive 5 offers or more. And the offer that arrives in piecemeal is just like most of the other offers. A seller might open only the purchase offer and none of the supporting documents just to note the price and forget about whatever else was sent.
Think of the end user, the seller. Are you making it easy for the seller to read your offer and accept your purchase offer? Are you sending documents that the seller doesn’t need such as disclosures and market condition notices?
To go into contract, sellers in Sacramento need the purchase contract, the agency disclosure, the earnest money deposit copy and the prepaproval letter (or POF). That’s it. No other documents or disclosures.
One last tip, make sure your PDF is not so large that it can’t be downloaded. Some buyer’s agents accept one-page scans returned as JPGs from the buyer. Those JPGs can be such a high resolution that the file becomes too big to email. Downsize it. Look at the MBs before hitting send in your email. If it exceed 5 MBs, that listing agent and seller might not be able to even open your attachment.
Can you imagine losing a home because the seller couldn’t open your offer?
On Selling That Real Estate Listing in Sacramento
No matter how many homes a Sacramento real estate agent has sold — and last year I sold around 165 — it is still exciting to have a new listing in Sacramento entered into MLS. It’s a feeling that never goes away for an agent. I’m not alone in this as other agents have expressed the same sentiment. Whether that new listing is 2 homes on a lot in Midtown or a highly desirable single-level home in Elk Grove, it’s still a thrill to baby a new listing. It’s also a reminder to pay extra special attention to the listings that might still be in inventory.
It’s easy for an agent to think after a couple of weeks on the market that an older listing is not quite as important as a newer listing, and that is a trap only naive listing agents fall into. An older listing is often more precious than a brand new listing because a) it involves a lot of work to get it b) a lot of work to input it and tweek photos c) an agent has seasoned feedback after a few weeks, and d) it’s easier to tell exactly what needs to be done to get that listing moved if it hasn’t, for some odd reason, already sold.
I never ever ignore an “aged” listing. I just try all the harder because my goal is never to lose a listing, and I have never had a listing in Sacramento that I could not sell.
My job is to figure out what makes a new listing different from every other listing on the market and to get that listing sold.
I just closed a listing in Sacramento yesterday that by all practical means should have blown up in smoke. I can’t begin to describe all of the ways the buyer’s lender messed up the closing. We were supposed to close at the end of the month and, when I suspected the lender, a major bank, had its share of difficulties, I asked Seterus to give us an extension to July 7th. Nope, said Seterus, no can do.
Part of the problem was I had nothing substantial to give Seterus in hopes of closing. I’ve learned a long time ago in this business that you don’t deliver bad news without a solution, a silver lining to soften the blow. So, I waited until docs were in escrow, when I had proof we could close, and asked again. This time, we received an extension from Fannie Mae that expired on the day we received it. Such a joker, that Fannie Mae.
I asked again for an extension from Seterus. It took a little bit more than a week, with the 4th of July and all, but Fannie Mae gave us 3 days this time to close, and close, we did! The buyer’s agent has one very happy buyer right now. It probably wouldn’t have been so tough on the buyer if the poor buyer didn’t also work for the stupid bank that couldn’t find its way in the dark with two maps and a flashlight. In fact, the buyer’s agent sent me an email that said I was the best agent he’s ever worked with. I hope that means he’s worked with hundreds of real estate agents and not just with those one can count on one hand.
Article 16 and a Sacramento Agent’s Listing
It’s not often that I have to ask another real estate agent to stop contacting my clients, but generally when I remind an agent that asking sellers pointed questions about selling their home — apart from making sellers uncomfortable — could be considered interference in another agent’s listing and a violation of Article 16 of the Code of Ethics, the offender stops.
Article 16 pertains only to a REALTOR. Not all real estate agents are REALTORs.
The agents might get ticked off at me for calling them on it, and some of them do. Comes with the territory; it’s a risk I take. There are agents who practice ethics and those who don’t. Those who practice ethics respect agents who do, and those who don’t, well, it doesn’t really matter what they think.
Agents sometimes interfere because they haven’t stopped to consider the consequences of their actions, or they feel that what they are doing is innocent (in their minds) and they haven’t looked at the hard, cold facts of how a Sacramento real estate agent or anybody else with a rationale mind might view it. Some agents think they are “helping” and they forget / overlook that they are interfering. I get that.
But if I sit on the fence and say nothing, I am perpetrating this behavior.
It’s a fine line to walk in this business.
Last week I asked an agent to please stop emailing my client with questions about selling her home. This particular seller’s name and personal information is not in MLS. If a buyer’s agent has questions, the agent can ask me, and I’ll be happy to assist. I don’t care if the agent knows the seller from church, through another professional association or spotted the seller at the gas station and struck up a conversation at the gas pump. Buyer’s agents are not supposed to grill, discuss or ask represented sellers questions about selling their home.
Like I said, this seller’s name and contact information is not even listed in MLS. There was no permission given to contact the seller. It’s bad enough when an agent calls a seller to schedule a showing, for example, and asks how many offers the seller has received. Big no-no. But agents have absolutely no right to even call a seller when the showing instructions state otherwise.
The real estate agent responded that the agent was not emailing my client, the agent was texting.
I see. It would seem that this Sacramento real estate agent might need to explain that:
- sending emails
- texting messages
- calling on a walkie-talkie, cell or landline
- writing letters
- dipping one’s finger in vanilla to write a secret message on white paper
- sending up smoke signals or
- standing out in front of the seller’s house and yelling
are all methods that are unacceptable behavior to contact the seller of a listed home to discuss details about selling the home.
All we are trying to do here is get to the closing table in one piece. We are all in this business together.
A Solution to the War Between Two Short Sale Banks
You’ve got life easy if you’ve never had to talk to short sale banks. Be thankful for that. Man, I used to see myself as a person with little patience. That’s one of the reasons why I tried back in my 20’s to learn how to sew. I was under the impression that sewing a dress would teach me patience. You know, you’ve got to trace the pattern on the cloth, carefully cut it out and figure out how to attach the pieces without sewing them inside out or upside down.
My dress ended up in the trash can. It wasn’t disappointing to me. It was satisfaction.
However, over the years, I seem to have acquired patience. I have no idea where it came from. One day it wasn’t there and the next it was. I toyed with the thought that it’s possible aliens have taken over my mind or maybe the 1960s had some sort of long-lasting effects like those flashbacks that never materialized. Hard to say, but patience is absolutely required if a Sacramento real estate agent needs to negotiate a short sale.
The latest irritation that popped up this year, part of the aftermath from passing the Homeowner Bill of Rights, is when the first lender and the second lender refuse to see eye-to-eye about issuing short sale approval. I’m not issuing approval first, says the first lender, arms folded, you issue it. So, we try to reason with the second lender. I’m not issuing approval first, says the second lender, let the first lender go first. What reminds me of being back in grade school has been going on all year long. It’s enough to make an agent with less patience smack ’em.
I understand the reasoning. If the second issues approval, it shows the hand of how much it will accept from the first. Some second lenders would rather let the first make an offer of compensation. On the other hand, if the first issues approval, not only does it set the stage for compensation to the second, because it does not want to revise the approval, but it is also obligated to stop all foreclosure action. Yeah, that’s the real reason. Now the first can’t move forward with foreclosure, especially if it can’t come to an agreement on compensation to the second.
Short sale approval is the only part of the Homeowner Bill of Rights that protects a seller in the event of a short sale. Applying for a short sale offers zero protection, none. Protection is afforded only after the short sale approval.
One solution to get around this stalemate is to have one of the lenders issue approval for a short time period. The letter can contain a short expiration date, like 7 days to 10 days out. And, that’s exactly what happened in a West Sacramento short sale today.
There are always ways around a problem. If you’re looking for a patient Sacramento real estate agent who finds solutions, call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916 233 6759.
Review of the Happy Together Tour at the Crest
What was it Flo and Eddy said last night at the Happy Together Tour at the Crest? Oh, yeah, drugs, man. How everybody in the audience can identify with the pot and the LDS trips, and now we’re all into: the Lipitor and Pepcin and Ibuprofin and Viagra. And then there was Mark Lindsay (from Paul Revere and the Raiders) who rattled on about wishing for the 1960s night after night and year after year only to wake up one morning and realize he had found the ’60s all right — his own 60s. But ya gotta give it to a guy who has not an inch of fat on his face, be it natural or otherwise, and can kick his leg over his head or drop at the waist in a bow to tuck his head into his crotch. Yeah, like he was made out of cardboard and could fold in two.
Show off.
Pfffbbbt.
He also gave the greatest pitch for a CD I’ve ever heard in my life. It was about curing all of your ails and increasing your sexual performance in the bedroom. Go … Mark!
When Gary Lewis (of Gary Lewis and the Playboys) opened, he identified the years when each of his songs were popular. I got a huge kick out of This Diamond Ring, which came out in 1965, singing along and bouncing, when my husband elbowed me and whispered: TWO, I was TWO and still eating strained baby food! But I can forgive him for that comment because guess who will be wheeling me around in my wheelchair down the road?
The show was a rockin’ good time, though. Can’t say much about Gary Puckett and his Las Vegas act. I don’t know what it is I have against Las Vegas acts, I mean, old performers have to go somewhere, but he was a bit too Holiday Innish for me. The Three Dog Night dude was great and a bit closer, my husband admitted, to his era. I loved the Turtles’ songs by Flo and Eddy. I forgot how much fun they could be, but that’s what almost 40 years will do to you — skew your memory.
Going to the Happy Together Tour show at the Crest, however, meant I was still up two hours past my bedtime. Although, even when I was 21, I was never one of those people who could party all night and still get up for work. Hey, that doesn’t mean I didn’t go to work. It means I just didn’t party on a school night.
But today is Sunday, and I will mostly likely spend most of this day color correcting photographs, tweaking, resizing and selecting the best pictures to put into MLS when my listings hit tomorrow. Little is worse for a buyer than to stare at dark, horrid photos in MLS. When home buyers spot photos like that, they have a license to flip right past the listing, and I’d be mortified if they ever did that to my listing.
That’s why I use a big ol’ honkin’ Nikon digital camera with an expensive 18 / 24 wide-angle lens and still spend hours fixing my photographs. As a Sacramento real estate agent, my clients can rely on my photographs to get a buyer into the house. You can bet my professional ability on it. Right after I take an after-breakfast nap.
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