You can ask nicely and can even sweeten the deal for them. 

For now they aren't that bad, start sweeten 'em up. 

Do some snooping on crime in the past, disputes/lawsuits in the past and see who is your buddy and who you need to sweeten up.

There is a due diligence fee in addition to an earnest money fee in North Carolina, and both of them can be used to sweeten up an offer. 

The assumptions I made are below:Closing costs are calculated to be 7% of final ARV purchase priceRehab costs are $100/sq ft and $75/sq ftLoan interest is the loan + 10% back to the private money investor (assuming I go that route)Total cost is the MPP + Closing Costs + Rehab CostsTotal Profit is ARV – Total CostOwner receives the MPP (what I would have paid for the house) + Closing Costs (I would have had to pay for these anyway, I could sweeten the deal for myself and offer to split them with the current owner) + Half the profitPrivate Money lender receives their initial loan plus 10% interestI receive the split profit – interest on the rehab loanMy goal was to get the owner as close to their $200k wish in order to convince them to do this less than traditional (and maybe not even possible) way.

@Meredith Hyman ask if there is anything else besides price that the seller is looking for that would sweeten the deal for them.

I try to over compensate for the rehab to where I know I won’t go over and numbers still look good then if I hit budget bam I expected that and if I come in under it just sweetens the deal.Hope this helps

or do you think Samsung is just doing this to sweeten the pot in Austin?

Try to find out the seller motivation and use that info to sweeten your offer.

We still would have been ok but it really sweetened the deal.