By Living Room Realty, October 16, 2019
S&S had been hitting open houses for a while, but hadn’t quite gotten serious in their pursuit. We connected at an open house over the fact that my wife is a teacher and how one of them also works in education. After hitting open houses for a few more months on their own, S&S decided to finally give me a call. I connected them with a lending institute that has a great first time home buyer program for educators. After getting pre-approved, we set off to look at a few properties that had caught their attention. We quickly determined they were all too small for their long term plans and they were going to require some pretty extensive updates in the near future given the age of the homes. I ran a quick home search on my Living Room App and picked a property that seemed to check every single box on their want/need lists, with the exception it was just in an area they hadn’t previously considered. This particular house was in St. Johns and in an area they were not familiar with. Upon pulling up to the property, the surrounding houses were beautiful, well kept, and spanning every decade, nothing cookie cutter about the neighborhood at all, and an easy walk straight into downtown St. Johns. The property had just taken a substantial price reduction. I could see that S&S were swoon, but also skeptical. This was only the fourth house we had looked at. I did not want to push them to make a decision that evening, but having knowledge of the area and the price point (and considering the fact that Dallas Patio Paver Installation were still on the property), I knew that if they didn’t move fast it was going to get bought quickly by someone else. As commute time to and from work was a big decision factor for them, I suggested they sleep on it and to drive to the house afterwork the following day and we could walk through it again. The next evening the commute was much more efficient to SW Portland than the previously considered neighborhoods and the house was just as great as the day before. I could tell it seemed to be happening really fast, so I suggested we sit down at the McMenamins down the Street to talk about writing an offer. We talked about how all of the systems on the house were modern and most of the mechanical had been updated. We talked about how the previous owner had taken great care of it and the updates were so neutral and well done. It would be an easy house to furnish any way and style. We talked about the previous properties that they had considered while shopping on their own and how they compared. I pulled some of the properties that had already sold to compare the “list price” to the actual “sold price” and it was pretty quickly determined that this property was a tremendous value. I could tell that they were both beginning to get excited. I never want to make a client feel pressured into a house, I had a strong feeling that if we didn’t make an offer that night the house would not be around the next day. Realizing the time, I suggested we submit an offer if they really wanted the house even though it was getting late. S&S decided to throw an offer out that evening. Our offer was signed and sent out at 9:15pm. I immediately received a message that a second offer had just come in. We were suddenly in a competitive multiple offer situation. With a review deadline of mid-day the following day. I don’t know that any of us slept much that night. I really didn’t want this to be a heartbreak house this early in working together and I also did not want them to get into a bidding war, but we needed to strengthen their offer if they wanted the house. S&S decided that they did not want to go up in price much, at which point I pointed out that a few other options would be to shorten some timelines as well as strengthen our terms and it worked! The offer was accepted! I couldn’t be happier for S&S! Their intuition and dedication to the process, as well as their trust in my agency made for a smooth and successful purchase! Congratulations S&S!
