Except in the case of Kissing Booths of course.

Buying a Short Sale? You should hope you are late to the party. Yeah, that’s right. In a short sale purchase it’s usually a good thing to be the second in line on an offer.

Here’s why.

I was consoling a client today because her Listing Agent reported to her that there had been only one offer made on the house and they were thinking they might withdraw it. She was worried.

“What if the house doesn’t sell?”

We look at it differently. Any offer, even a bad offer is a good offer.

• It allows us to complete a package.
• It allows to get that package into the Lender’s system.
• It allows us the Lender to assign that package to an Asset Manager.
• It allows the Lender to tell us what they’ll accept. We now have a baseline.
• That allows us start negotiating.

“But what if the Offer is withdrawn or by the time the lender comes back to you, the buyer has bought something else?”

That’s ok. The hardest thing about a short sale is getting to the part where the Lender is actually working on a package. Getting that package into an Asset Manager’s hands is really Step One. The rest is easy.

There will be other offers. When they come in (and they will) the time consuming work will have already been done.

Ever see a Short Sale close in three days? We have. It’s because the groundwork had already been done.

That’s why making a backup offer on a Short Sale in progress might be one of the smartest (and quickest) ways to get accepted and closed.

Go ahead and send a thank you card to the first offer. You owe them!

Labels: Negotiation, Short Sale, Short Sale Negotiation