What Are Your Favorite Questions to Flesh-Out A Sellers Motivation?

[Burt L.]

In  working in a strong market, I find that using the time honored question of - If I pay cash and  close quickly, what is the least you would take? - kills deals as they know this is desperation pricing and they aren't desperate. I also avoid asking - Whats your situation? - as its so well known that this compromises a persons negotiation.

 Very few of my deals have come from desperate people.  It is so easy to sell a property in any condition currently that there is little distress other than probates or foreclosures and I don't have the cash or stomach for blind auction buying. Absentee owners and high equity owners just have too many other options.

So I work with some of the following questions, unless someone is just tire-kicking and I do use the usual questions above  to draw things to a close. Here are some of my questions to begin to measure motivation:

1) What is the timeframe you would like to close on the property in?

2) Have the tenants generally been well-behaved?

3) Are you happy with the management companies performance?

Another related topic is how to express that mine would be a time-sensitive offer as some think its a standing offer and they can shop around and get back at ones convenience.

What are your favorite questions to measure seller motivation?