All Forum Posts by: Tyler M

I wish we had never listed the home while we were out of town and could not really show it because of tenant but what can we do to salvage the situation and make this listing come to life?
This house is in Orange County CA. If anyone is familiar with RE trends in this area.

Hello, hope everyone is doing well.

In the past few days I have learned a lot of new info about the situation of selling the family home. We used a flat fee listing company to list the home a few months ago while I was away but we had a tenant in there. She agreed to show the house but people were coming at all hours so she put up a sign no soliciting. I was out of town and spoke with family members who said that there were no good offers. (I now found out that there were offers which I saw in the cabinet, but I think they just did not want to sell, also we had a tenant in there)
I want to try to sell the house myself now that is why I used a flat fee listing since Im not working right now and I want the experience, so far I have bought 3 homes at auction and rented them so I know a bit. We have had many offers on our house over the past few days since I have come back to town and am over seeing the sale. The house is listed for 445k (which I have now confirmed is low- even a couple of the buyers realtors admitted this- surprisingly) , We had a Realtor and her son visit the house and offer us 420k cash. They seemed really friendly and like nice people she said her son was getting married and needed to find a place and they really like the house. I believed them but we had loan offers that were higher so I told her the only way we would consider their offer is if she waived her commission since we are not going to take that much of a cut in price just because we have a cash offer. I never heard back from them when I suggested that. I sat there thinking why would a Realtor and her son want to pay 420k cash for a home that rents for about 2000 a month? Then I realized that they were just flippers who realize that the home is worth about 480k if they buy 420k cash from us the mom gets a 3% commission and then they put it right back on the market after a few upgrades for about 480k. Our best offers are close to 480k already anyway through conventional loans. The home is in good condition but it is VERY dated. We have decided to invest in new carpet, paint, scraped ceilings etc., tile, (I can get good prices on these) then we will put it back on the market for around 480k. I figure its our family home so we should at least try to get fair market value for it or else the flippers will. We would much rather sell to an owner occupant anyway, someone who will appreciate the home.

Now heres my question for all you strategists out there, my flat fee listing is about to expire. The problem with this flat fee listing service is that they charge about the same to change the pictures as to pay for a new listing. I know many will say just hire a realtor but I would prefer to do this myself because I enjoy it. The Days on the market is close to 365 now and is ready to expire. The truth is that I just started showing the home about a week ago. Would it be better for me to just pay for a new listing- where I can take new photos of all the upgrages we are installing? Also the Days on the Market would be reset. (which would actually be more accurate of the days it has been shown- Again I realize that realtors will see the CDOM) I look at competing houses in my area and the realtors do all kinds of stuff like delisting, relisting multiple times etc. etc. I can't do anything like that because it all costs a lot on flat fee listing so my plan was just get the house into the best shape I can and then put it back on the market with new photos. The current list price is 445k with old photos even though I am going to relist it at 480k completely upgraded. About 20 people are calling a day to see the house, I have been telling these people who call that the house is being upgraded and should be ready in a couple weeks but they still think the price is 445k. Should I just tell them the new price is 480k on the phone or should I take the house off the market now while it is being upgraded and I am waiting to take new pictures? Or should I change the price to 480k on the current listing (while keeping the old photos up) and when the home is ready then just change the photos? I cannot show the home for a couple weeks anyway so how should I handle inquiries during that time? I have a feeling I might lose these people when I tell them the new price of 480 even thought the home is being COMPLETELY upgraded because they already saw the listing of 445k. How do I relist with new photos at market value of 480k without people seeing the 445k price? With a good property add description? I noticed my competition is listing well above market for 515k is that to leave room for negotiation or are they not serious sellers?

Any suggestions for upgrades for a home in the 500k range? Would it be more important to upgrade a 500k home than a 80k home? We still have pop corn ceilings right now. I was thinking of adding granite counters in the bathrooms. Is crown molding necessary? If I accept a loan offer I want to make sure the house will appraise, so I was thinking if I get some granite, hard wood floors in there it may appraise for a higher value. Anyone have experience with this?

Thank you all for any ideas.

Thank you everyone for your well thought out responses. I was just curious to learn more about how bidding wars work. Apparently the MO in this area is what I described above. Perhaps that is why houses the same model as ours near the train tracks are getting relatively high offers. Who knows for sure...
Thanks again

Hello, hope everyone is doing well this summer.

Our family is in the process of trying to sell our home in Orange County, southern Ca. We used a flat fee listing company. We have had the house for sale for almost a year for around 450k. Not too many offers at that price. We got a couple for 400k. I believe the true value to be between 430k and 460k (the same model of home in inferior locations- near the train tracks) have sold for this much. Since we are trying to sell the house ourselves I have done some reading on how to start a bidding war when selling your property.
I was just looking for more feedback from all of you out there. It said often people price their homes low to attract attention from potential buyers.
If the true value is about 440k would it be wise to lower the listing price to 400k or even lower like 375k?

If we get any offers at this point would we tell the bidders that we got another offer for 440k? I believe 440k is more than a fair price for the property. We only have one month left for our listing then we have to pay the $500 fee again. How can we sell this house as quickly as possible for the best price? Also in about a month we have to go out of town for a few months so won't have time to sell it, so its crunch time.

Than you for any ideas,

Chris.

Hi Chris and Jon thanks a lot for all the good info it has taken me quite a while to review everything, definitely a lot to consider here.

Hi Kevin and Jon thank you for the good advice. I forgot to add that my parents receive a combined pension of about 2k a month.

I forgot to mention that both my parents are retired so all they have to invest is some savings for downpayments, their credit scores.

Hello, I hope everyone is doing well. I was trying to help my parents invest in RE and was wondering what the best strategy would be for getting loans and using leverage.
I heard that you can get a maximum of ten loans for each person but the first five you only have to put down 20% but for the next five you may have to put down close to 30% and maybe the interest rates won't be as good.
My mom has a 780 credit score I don't think my dads is as good I think it is about 700. How can they obtain the maximum amount of loans? They have enough money for down payments on about 20 houses combined if each house sells for 75k. Is it important that each person applies separately to get the maximum of 10 loans each or can they apply for each conventional loan together and put both their names on each mortgage and still get 20 loans combined?

Thank you for any info.

We kind of wanted to first get a loan for a property that is about 50k IF the bank is willing to make more loans to us. But if they will only make one loan (because we only have a small pension as income right now) I think it would be better to apply for a larger loan and look at purchasing a multi family property. That way we will be able to leverage a greater percent of our 600k. Whereas with a 50k loan we will have only used a 10k down payment and still have 590k left- it just seems like a poor use of (possibly) limited leverage. I have done a lot of searching on line for this info but have found contradicting statements.

Hello, although we have about 600k to invest we are retired and the only income we have right now is a $1500 a month pension, we have good credit. Someone sent me a link to an article on November 20th, 2011 that said- ."In a significant change in lending standards, underwriters are now counting rental income toward income qualification. This means you only need a down payment and a 700 FICO score to buy an income property so long as its cashflow positive"
I would think that this would be a real game changer for a lot of people but have not heard much about this from other sources. Are you familiar with this new change? Since we only have a pension this change would allow us to get loans correct? Whereas before you needed to show income from other sources in order to buy a cashflow property. If too many people started doing this I wonder if this would cause downward pressure on rents. Lol, Do you think we could have a rent bubble?