Sellers Playing Chicken. Call Their Bluff?

[Will Johnston]

This morning I put in an asking price offer on an MLS-listed house with an escalation cost to nearly 10% above asking price. (There were multiple offers.) It's a well priced property, and my numbers still work at the high end of the deal.

I just got a call from my realtor telling me that the sellers want best and highest by 5 PM tomorrow with no escalation clause.  She thinks that the other offers were probably at or below my offer, so they're hoping to just get me to offer a higher amount.

I figure my options are:

A) Resubmit my original asking price offer.
B) Offer a couple thousand more than asking price.  I'm not willing to just flat out offer the full amount of what I would have escalated to.
C) Tell them they have my best and highest offer, and that I need a response by 5 PM today or I'm pulling the offer.

I feel like option C could pressure them to make a decision immediately rather than wait for other offers (potentially higher than mine) to come in.