Open house today......give your thoughts, prayers, juju, whatever

[DawnM]

Just now, Seasider too said:

 

I am sorry. I never do real estate business with personal friends as agents. It’s too messy of a business. 

Sorry, realtor boardies, but I learned this the hard way. It’s strictly business. 

 

This was more of the "I need a referral" type of thing.  I didn't really know the full relationship.  She had sold their previous house, helped them buy a house, and helped a few of her friends and family. 

[lmrich]

Instead of a curtain...look on Pinterest to see how people use Ikea bookcases to separate rooms. Just an idea. Another idea for staging - when or if you want to make a smaller room, you can buy a toddler bed or crib to put in there and stage it as a nursery. 

[Carol in Cal.]

FWIW, I would personally love the specific quirks you are mentioning, particularly the kitchen being so central to serving into the other common rooms.  

Even the one bedroom leading into the other is something I would enjoy (private office in back of the bedroom?  Or library/sitting room.) 

I know I am quirky, but I hope that my quirks match someone's in your area that would love your home.

[mumto2]

I haven’t gone back and read all the posts again and this may have been crossed off as an idea already but I believe your Dh has a den downstairs in a technical bedroom.  Could you turn the linked bedroom into a den/library and give college boy the former den for the summer?

[DawnM]

9 hours ago, lmrich said:

Instead of a curtain...look on Pinterest to see how people use Ikea bookcases to separate rooms. Just an idea. Another idea for staging - when or if you want to make a smaller room, you can buy a toddler bed or crib to put in there and stage it as a nursery. 

 

It would not be a good nursery.  The master is on the main floor and that bedroom is pretty far away.   But a little boy's room maybe with a toddler bed would work, but it would require me to go purchase a toddler bed and toys and spend more money for things I wont' ever use.

[DawnM]

9 hours ago, Carol in Cal. said:

FWIW, I would personally love the specific quirks you are mentioning, particularly the kitchen being so central to serving into the other common rooms.  

Even the one bedroom leading into the other is something I would enjoy (private office in back of the bedroom?  Or library/sitting room.) 

I know I am quirky, but I hope that my quirks match someone's in your area that would love your home.

 

Thank you!  We loved it when we moved here.  It worked perfectly for a long time, and we only had 2 kids who wanted to share the front room and use the back room as a play room.  In fact, for about 10 years that room was called "the lego room."   It was wall to wall legos. 😪(crying face because I miss it!)

I just need someone else to love it now.

[lmrich]

Price it out... buying  a toddler bed at a thrift store could be about 10 bucks and a few toys another 15. Talk to your realtor about the value in adding a true bedroom there. Price it out and compare it to dropping the price of your house. 

When staging our home, I found beautiful, handmade toys that I had saved so I made my adult son's room look like it was an 8 year-old boy's room. No lie, we got an offer from a family with an 8 year-old boy.  

 

[hjffkj]

I will just say that adding a set of stairs to the bedroom to fix the walk through issue won't fix it really. It'll just make the house quirkier. I know this because that is how our house is set up. While we walked through the house at the open house we still viewed it as a walkthrough room since it would be inconvenient to go all the way around the house to get somewhere that is a wall away. 

We do love having a second set of steps so we don't have to walk through the room but our first reaction was, ' oh a walk through room how will we cope with that.' so the problem is still there and buyers will see it.

[Scarlett]

My vote is to take what you can get and move out of the district.  Extra commuting time for 3 years will probably balance out with how much happier you will be in a house better suited to you.  

I am there with my house.  I am just so over it. 

[DawnM]

8 hours ago, lmrich said:

Price it out... buying  a toddler bed at a thrift store could be about 10 bucks and a few toys another 15. Talk to your realtor about the value in adding a true bedroom there. Price it out and compare it to dropping the price of your house. 

When staging our home, I found beautiful, handmade toys that I had saved so I made my adult son's room look like it was an 8 year-old boy's room. No lie, we got an offer from a family with an 8 year-old boy.  

 

 

Sigh, I also have the issue of TIME.  I work full time and prepping for a huge test in a few weeks and keeping the house immaculate and working is about all I can handle right now.  Shopping and staging and extra for the immediate future just isn't happening.  I have literally done 90% of any shopping online, while on lunch break, because I have so much going on.

Thrift stores are hit or miss and require a lot of effort to find just what you need.  I used to thrift store shop a lot and find wonderful things, but it took time and energy to find them.

Edited May 14, 2019 by DawnM

[DawnM]

44 minutes ago, Seasider too said:

I keep thinking your walk thru room would make a great homework area with bookshelves and a library table.

But I also agree that it could be inexpensively be staged as a young child’s room. Or, still got that LEGO? Break it out and resurrect the LEGO room! My adult children would even love that!

 

It is currently staged with musical equipment (guitar, electric piano), a TV with game controls, a desk and gaming chair, and just a hang out room for teens.

There is not a bed in there.  

Edited May 15, 2019 by DawnM

[Tree Frog]

One of the things we've done when we've sold houses is to leave a notebook with all relevant info in sheet protectors about the house: a utility  bill, a water bill, distance between locations, etc. I believe one of our homes sold quickly because of this notebook. I wonder if you could acknowledge the quirkiness in a positive way and leave some information about different ways the room could be handled: as an office, as a playroom, a guest room, an art, hobby, or music room (away from the rest of the house), etc.  Sometimes people need help to see the possibilities and visually seeing something might jump start their thoughts about how the house would work for their family. 

[Stacia]

1 hour ago, wilrunner said:

One of the things we've done when we've sold houses is to leave a notebook with all relevant info in sheet protectors about the house: a utility  bill, a water bill, distance between locations, etc. I believe one of our homes sold quickly because of this notebook. I wonder if you could acknowledge the quirkiness in a positive way and leave some information about different ways the room could be handled: as an office, as a playroom, a guest room, an art, hobby, or music room (away from the rest of the house), etc.  Sometimes people need help to see the possibilities and visually seeing something might jump start their thoughts about how the house would work for their family. 

I haven't read the entire thread but I so agree with the sentiment that some people need help to see the possibilities in a visual way.

I say this because a friend was house shopping. She looked at two houses in the same neighborhood. Both by the same builder, both with *exactly* the same layout. First one had the front room being used as a living room (there was a separate family room across the back of the house). Friend wasn't interested because she didn't want/need a living room. The other house had that front room used as a home office. Bingo! She needed a home office & could see the set up. Guess which house she bought? (It boggles my mind because I can imagine possibilities without seeing them, but her looking/buying was a lesson for me in that some people need an exact layout/staging to make them want the house.)

For the quirky area, could you have one of those computer programs where you put in the room, then decorate it different ways? Then print it out each one & put them on a display board in the room to show the various possibilities like wilrunner has mentioned?

Edited May 15, 2019 by Stacia

[DawnM]

6 hours ago, Stacia said:

I haven't read the entire thread but I so agree with the sentiment that some people need help to see the possibilities in a visual way.

I say this because a friend was house shopping. She looked at two houses in the same neighborhood. Both by the same builder, both with *exactly* the same layout. First one had the front room being used as a living room (there was a separate family room across the back of the house). Friend wasn't interested because she didn't want/need a living room. The other house had that front room used as a home office. Bingo! She needed a home office & could see the set up. Guess which house she bought? (It boggles my mind because I can imagine possibilities without seeing them, but her looking/buying was a lesson for me in that some people need an exact layout/staging to make them want the house.)

For the quirky area, could you have one of those computer programs where you put in the room, then decorate it different ways? Then print it out each one & put them on a display board in the room to show the various possibilities like wilrunner has mentioned?

 

Yes, this boggles my mind too.  But my realtor has said I amaze her because I can walk through a house others can't figure out what room is what (particularly in empty homes) and tell her exactly how I can picture each room's use.

Even my realtor thinks I should go into real estate.  I love looking at homes!  But I don't like the actual selling part and dealing with angry people, and working every weekend......so, I haven't really entertained it beyond a passing thought.

[DawnM]

6 hours ago, Stacia said:

I haven't read the entire thread but I so agree with the sentiment that some people need help to see the possibilities in a visual way.

I say this because a friend was house shopping. She looked at two houses in the same neighborhood. Both by the same builder, both with *exactly* the same layout. First one had the front room being used as a living room (there was a separate family room across the back of the house). Friend wasn't interested because she didn't want/need a living room. The other house had that front room used as a home office. Bingo! She needed a home office & could see the set up. Guess which house she bought? (It boggles my mind because I can imagine possibilities without seeing them, but her looking/buying was a lesson for me in that some people need an exact layout/staging to make them want the house.)

For the quirky area, could you have one of those computer programs where you put in the room, then decorate it different ways? Then print it out each one & put them on a display board in the room to show the various possibilities like wilrunner has mentioned?

 

Where would I get one of those computer programs?   

Yesterday the realtor showed up at 6:30pm for a 7pm showing.  He came without his clients and said he was sorry, he had meant to schedule a 30 min. walk through with us before the showing and forgot.  We welcomed him in and he said, "Tell me about your house!"  It was awesome.  I wish every realtor would do that.   We were able to show him the room and tell him some ideas we had had.

They stayed for over an hour.  I am not positive that means anything though.  He said he was meeting these clients for the first time, which usually means they sat down and used our house as a place to talk for a while and they want to see other homes too.

Edited May 15, 2019 by DawnM

[Melissa in Australia]

We have a bedroom that needs to be walked through to another bedroom. We call it the dressing room and have it set up as one.

[TechWife]

On 5/11/2019 at 10:44 PM, Catwoman said:

Can the realtor get an associate from her office to run the open houses for her? 

I don’t think it’s reasonable for a realtor to be out of town every weekend during the busiest selling season of the year. She is shortchanging you and all of her other listings. 

I agree. We made an offer on our first house on Memorial Day weekend. When we sold it, we received the offer Labor Day weekend. While I wouldn't expect the same realtor to be available during every single holiday and every single weekend, being unavailable every weekend during one of the hottest real estate sales months of the year is inconceivable to me.

Here, very often realtors have multiple open houses on a weekend and they have assistants, friends, relatives, etc. staff them. There really isn't much to hosting an open house.

[Annie G]

11 minutes ago, TechWife said:

 

Here, very often realtors have multiple open houses on a weekend and they have assistants, friends, relatives, etc. staff them. There really isn't much to hosting an open house.

I’ve never run across that. I would be mad if my realtor had her friend or relative run my open house. I expect the person to know about the property and about real estate so they can answer questions.  Also, lots of agents become a buyer’s agent at open houses. Hey, you’re looking for a house but don’t like this one? Do you have an agent?  No? Here’s my card. 

I’m not disputing that this isn’t a typical scenario in your area, but I do think there’s more to running an open house if the intention is to find a serious buyer.

[TechWife]

2 minutes ago, Annie G said:

I’ve never run across that. I would be mad if my realtor had her friend or relative run my open house. I expect the person to know about the property and about real estate so they can answer questions.  Also, lots of agents become a buyer’s agent at open houses. Hey, you’re looking for a house but don’t like this one? Do you have an agent?  No? Here’s my card.  

I’m not disputing that this isn’t a typical scenario in your area, but I do think there’s more to running an open house if the intention is to find a serious buyer.

 

Here most often open houses are held on Parade of Homes weekend. That's a weekend when builders association has open model homes for he general public and they compete with each other for a variety of design awards. It isn't uncommon that a realtor would have a couple of homes "on parade" and also a few other homes in the same neighborhood that they have also listed. They will also have open houses at those other homes at the same time.  Then there is another agent that has homes in the neighborhood they have listed, but has no homes "on parade," but they have open house during the Parade weekends so that they can take advantage of foot traffic. As a sellers market, most homes don't need an open house to sell & most open houses are in neighborhoods under construction where the builder has one or more spec houses open so that people can see what their house will look like when it is built. Open houses for resale homes are fairly rare. If they are done, it is typically the first weekend a listing is up or if a house has been on the market an unusually long time, which typically means there is an issue the owner can't address, such as a layout issue or a school zoning issue, that is making the house harder to sell.

[Scarlett]

14 minutes ago, Annie G said:

I’ve never run across that. I would be mad if my realtor had her friend or relative run my open house. I expect the person to know about the property and about real estate so they can answer questions.  Also, lots of agents become a buyer’s agent at open houses. Hey, you’re looking for a house but don’t like this one? Do you have an agent?  No? Here’s my card. 

I’m not disputing that this isn’t a typical scenario in your area, but I do think there’s more to running an open house if the intention is to find a serious buyer.

And see my feeling is an open house is just to get exposure.  'Must see inside' type deal.

But I don't think buying and selling houses is all that complicated.

[PeppermintPattie]

5 hours ago, Melissa in Australia said:

We have a bedroom that needs to be walked through to another bedroom. We call it the dressing room and have it set up as one.

 

I'd do this - set it up as anything but a bedroom for your next open house. 

[Pink and Green Mom]

6 hours ago, DawnM said:

 

Where would I get one of those computer programs?   

 

Your realtor may have access to a program like this.  These were used a lot in FL - lots of empty homes, but they are "virtually staged" online and look pretty real.  One realtor at an open house showed us on the computer how easy it was to drop and drag furniture, decor, artwork, etc. into a room.

Edited May 15, 2019 by Pink and Green Mom

[Stacia]

58 minutes ago, Pink and Green Mom said:

Your realtor may have access to a program like this.  These were used a lot in FL - lots of empty homes, but they are "virtually staged" online and look pretty real.  One realtor at an open house showed us on the computer how easy it was to drop and drag furniture, decor, artwork, etc. into a room.

I agree. It's a great idea to check with your realtor/her company about using this.

I wonder if a staging company would offer this kind of service too?

I don't know about particular programs but here is one I found:

http://visualstager.com/

[Storygirl]

Last year, we put our house on the market in April. It's a seller's market here, so we were disappointed that we didn't have many showings for the first month. Especially because there were several other homes in our neighborhood that did sell during that time.

Our realtor decided to have an open house at the end of May, and we got two offers on Memorial Day and closed in mid-June.

So open houses can work for selling (though they have a reputation around here for not being effective).

And, also, don't give up!!!

Even though I know how discouraging it is (our previous homes took about nine months to sell -- while we were living in them with four little kids --  so we know about feeling discouraged).

[DawnM]

5 hours ago, Annie G said:

I’ve never run across that. I would be mad if my realtor had her friend or relative run my open house. I expect the person to know about the property and about real estate so they can answer questions.  Also, lots of agents become a buyer’s agent at open houses. Hey, you’re looking for a house but don’t like this one? Do you have an agent?  No? Here’s my card. 

I’m not disputing that this isn’t a typical scenario in your area, but I do think there’s more to running an open house if the intention is to find a serious buyer.

 

Well, I get the other person in the office or I don't get an open house.  She had planned to take her elderly mother to another state this weekend to stay with her brother and next weekend she had plans with her grandchildren while their parents leave town.

Then my son comes home from college and we have a whole 'nother problem.

So I will take what I can get right now.

[Annie G]

Just now, DawnM said:

 

Well, I get the other person in the office or I don't get an open house.  She had planned to take her elderly mother to another state this weekend to stay with her brother and next weekend she had plans with her grandchildren while their parents leave town.

Then my son comes home from college and we have a whole 'nother problem.

So I will take what I can get right now.

The other person in the office is totally acceptable, and sometimes in our area it’s someone who is not yet licensed but working towards that.  Someone hired as office staff but working towards a license. To me that’s a big difference than the realtor calling a random friend. 

Taking her mom out of state is reasonable, and so is watching the grands. But back to back weekends of not being available would be an issue for me if it became a pattern.  Maybe it won’t matter- maybe you’ll get an offer this weekend, or at least before your son comes home! 

I totally sympathize with you on the quirky house. The one we’re selling was built in 1880 and has a bajillion rooms, some of them quirky. We used the dining room as a school room  when our kids were young, but it has wainscoting and a light that hangs down. The feedback is that new owners want a dining room. Well put your dining table in there, people! Just because WE don’t have a table in there doesn’t mean you can’t. It’s clearly intended to be a dining room. have some imagination, folks. 

[DawnM]

1 minute ago, Annie G said:

The other person in the office is totally acceptable, and sometimes in our area it’s someone who is not yet licensed but working towards that.  Someone hired as office staff but working towards a license. To me that’s a big difference than the realtor calling a random friend. 

Taking her mom out of state is reasonable, and so is watching the grands. But back to back weekends of not being available would be an issue for me if it became a pattern.  Maybe it won’t matter- maybe you’ll get an offer this weekend, or at least before your son comes home! 

I totally sympathize with you on the quirky house. The one we’re selling was built in 1880 and has a bajillion rooms, some of them quirky. We used the dining room as a school room  when our kids were young, but it has wainscoting and a light that hangs down. The feedback is that new owners want a dining room. Well put your dining table in there, people! Just because WE don’t have a table in there doesn’t mean you can’t. It’s clearly intended to be a dining room. have some imagination, folks. 

 

I know!  Can you not see anything but what is in there?  Seriously?  Don't you have your own stuff to personalize?

[happi duck]

12 hours ago, DawnM said:

 

Where would I get one of those computer programs?   

Yesterday the realtor showed up at 6:30pm for a 7pm showing.  He came without his clients and said he was sorry, he had meant to schedule a 30 min. walk through with us before the showing and forgot.  We welcomed him in and he said, "Tell me about your house!"  It was awesome.  I wish every realtor would do that.   We were able to show him the room and tell him some ideas we had had.

They stayed for over an hour.  I am not positive that means anything though.  He said he was meeting these clients for the first time, which usually means they sat down and used our house as a place to talk for a while and they want to see other homes too.

My brother and I sold our childhood home last year.  There was nothing like it on the market and our family had owned it since 1953.  Not quirky but unusual to be for sale.

Our realtor held several brokers' open houses during the week. (I think she lured them with food!) She was able to give them all a walk-thru and point out special features and discuss possibilities for certain rooms etc.

Maybe your realtor would consider getting other realtors on board like this.

[DawnM]

The people who were here for 1.5 hours on Tue want to come back tomorrow for a 2nd showing.  Their realtor told our realtor that our house checked most of their boxes and they are seriously considering an offer but want to check a couple of things first.  Not sure what they want to check, but I do know that after I look at a house I don't remember some stuff about it and want to go back or get clarification if I am interested.

So......keep the prayers and thoughts comin' 

They are thinking they would like to make an offer this weekend, so maybe????

[DawnM]

And I did tell her that if she is planning to be gone for the next 2 weeks and we get an offer, I will need someone from her office to show us some houses ASAP!

[DawnM]

1 minute ago, WendyAndMilo said:

The times I've gone back for a second showing have been to measure something specific for a particular piece of furniture or double check appliances/hookups.  Pretty much already sold on the house but need to get my wheels in motion on how to make certain things work.

Fingers crossed for you!!

 

The realtor told our realtor this is the first house they have wanted to look at again and the first one to check most of their boxes.......so, sounds promising, but trying not to get my hopes up too much.

We may go back and look at a house again but that is because we looked at it almost 2 months ago and this is the only one of our original saved houses left that hans't sold!

Edited May 16, 2019 by DawnM

[DawnM]

And while I am at it, I may as well ask for prayers that DH and I don't fight about how much we are willing to take.  He LOVES "the game" of back and forth and it makes him invigorated to see how much we can banter.  I HATE it and will not lose a sale on a few thousand dollars.

[mlktwins]

4 minutes ago, DawnM said:

And while I am at it, I may as well ask for prayers that DH and I don't fight about how much we are willing to take.  He LOVES "the game" of back and forth and it makes him invigorated to see how much we can banter.  I HATE it and will not lose a sale on a few thousand dollars.

Just went through this with my dad's house, but it was me and DH who poured blood, sweat, and tears into it to get it ready for sale.  We didn't have a good weekend 2 weeks ago because of arguing over 2 offers!  I just wanted to be done with it all -- LOL.  It's all over now and we are both happy :-), but it is so stressful!!!  Hang in there...seems like you are getting close!!!

[Catwoman]

2 minutes ago, DawnM said:

And while I am at it, I may as well ask for prayers that DH and I don't fight about how much we are willing to take.  He LOVES "the game" of back and forth and it makes him invigorated to see how much we can banter.  I HATE it and will not lose a sale on a few thousand dollars.

 

I agree with you on that! It’s too big a gamble, particularly when you haven’t exactly been swamped with offers and you would like to sell as quickly as possible. 

If you get an offer, it’s not worth losing the sale over a few thousand dollars — and every time you go back and forth, there’s a risk that the buyers will either view you as unreasonable or that they will have kept looking and found another house in the meantime.

Praying they offer enough that you can just say SOLD and not even have to negotiate!

[Ottakee]

47 minutes ago, DawnM said:

And while I am at it, I may as well ask for prayers that DH and I don't fight about how much we are willing to take.  He LOVES "the game" of back and forth and it makes him invigorated to see how much we can banter.  I HATE it and will not lose a sale on a few thousand dollars.

If it is a reasonable offer and one you can live with, TAKE IT.  Our realtor advised that often your first offer will be the best one and you risk losing a sale if you turn it down (not to say you can't counter offer but be reasonable).

My sister had a quirky house.  Got an offer right away, they turned it down..........2 years of mortgage payments and repairs later they finally sold it for LESS than the first offer.

When I was looking to buy several years ago, I put in a FULL PRICE CASH offer on the house with only contingency being an inspection and I was turned down as the owner knew that there were several families in our township displaced by a highway project and she wanted to get us into a bidding war.  Well, the other couple and I had decided before to NOT do that with any house.  The next morning a different house showed up on the listings at 6am and by noon I had put in my offer and they accepted by 1pm.  Later that first lady contacted our realtor wanted to accept my offer.  In the end, she lost her house to foreclosure.

[DawnM]

1 hour ago, Ottakee said:

If it is a reasonable offer and one you can live with, TAKE IT.  Our realtor advised that often your first offer will be the best one and you risk losing a sale if you turn it down (not to say you can't counter offer but be reasonable).

My sister had a quirky house.  Got an offer right away, they turned it down..........2 years of mortgage payments and repairs later they finally sold it for LESS than the first offer.

When I was looking to buy several years ago, I put in a FULL PRICE CASH offer on the house with only contingency being an inspection and I was turned down as the owner knew that there were several families in our township displaced by a highway project and she wanted to get us into a bidding war.  Well, the other couple and I had decided before to NOT do that with any house.  The next morning a different house showed up on the listings at 6am and by noon I had put in my offer and they accepted by 1pm.  Later that first lady contacted our realtor wanted to accept my offer.  In the end, she lost her house to foreclosure.

 

You don't need to convince me, it is DH who needs convincing.  Honestly, he loves the thrill of the chase and bantering back and forth.  I HATE it.  Unless it is an unreasonable offer, I will push to accept it.  I just won't get picky over a few thousand.  But this time around, he knows I am DONE and want out, so I think as long as it isn't a super low ball offer, we will take it.

It is interesting, a house we like is still on the market after 400 days.  The realtor lives next door.  He came over while we were looking at it.   He told us that she had an offer close to full price the first month she listed it.  She turned it down.  Then she got another offer for less 45 days later.  She turned that down.

Now, she has lowered the price SIGNIFICANTLY BELOW either offer.    It is still a bit pricey for us, but very well priced for the house itself.  It is on our radar.

 

[Carol in Cal.]

1 hour ago, Ottakee said:

If it is a reasonable offer and one you can live with, TAKE IT.  Our realtor advised that often your first offer will be the best one and you risk losing a sale if you turn it down (not to say you can't counter offer but be reasonable).

 

We bought our cabin 5 1/2 years ago.  We had put in an offer in the spring, and for several reasons the deal fell apart in escrow.  By the fall, the price had dropped below what we offered, which was below what we went into contract for, and we got it for that.  We ended up buying below market price, and saved about 15% relative to what we would have had to pay had the escrow gone through *earlier that year*.

[Runningmom80]

I hope your buyer finds you soon! 

[DawnM]

46 minutes ago, Carol in Cal. said:

We bought our cabin 5 1/2 years ago.  We had put in an offer in the spring, and for several reasons the deal fell apart in escrow.  By the fall, the price had dropped below what we offered, which was below what we went into contract for, and we got it for that.  We ended up buying below market price, and saved about 15% relative to what we would have had to pay had the escrow gone through *earlier that year*.

 

We will not be doing that.  If we have to sell that low, we will just stay here until DS is through high school and we can move to wherever we want.

I don't want to do that.  I want to move now, but if we can't, we can't.

[Catwoman]

Praying that you will get an offer this weekend!

[DawnM]

Thank you.  They still haven't confirmed a time for today's visit, so not sure they are coming today.  I hope they aren't rethinking.

[Pink and Green Mom]

Good luck, Dawn.  This entire process is so stressful. 

[PrincessMommy]

just seeing this... hopefully they came and fell in love.   

[DawnM]

They did not come back yesterday.  They called my realtor and said it will be later this weekend as something came up for Friday.

We have another open house today.

[DawnM]

ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!

So, I just looked at the flyers my realtor made for our open house.  (Realtor is in Kansas today) and it says "Warp around front porch."

I will either yank them and not have them given out or I will reprint them.  I have just emailed her and asked for an editable PDF of the flyer.

SO FRUSTRATED.

[PrincessMommy]

@DawnM  how frustrating!  

[happi duck]

A typo is frustrating but I think you can still use them if you can't print corrected ones.

People will recognize it as a typo and it could be memorable!  "Let's go back and see the one with the warp around porch!"

[Carol in Cal.]

Sloppy !!!  Annoying!

[Carol in Cal.]

On 5/16/2019 at 5:03 PM, Carol in Cal. said:

We bought our cabin 5 1/2 years ago.  We had put in an offer in the spring, and for several reasons the deal fell apart in escrow.  By the fall, the price had dropped below what we offered, which was below what we went into contract for, and we got it for that.  We ended up buying below market price, and saved about 15% relative to what we would have had to pay had the escrow gone through *earlier that year*.

I would like to add—we were not jerks about this.

The reasons the deal fell apart were real and bad.  The seller had neglected the property after moving out, and because of an oversight on her part the pipes froze and ruined both bathrooms.  Then our realtor decided to become a teacher, and passed off the deal to an associate we had never met.  We were in escrow when all this happened, and the price we were paying was a bit higher than what I thought the market value was anyway, and I became very uncomfortable that the place was not as well maintained as it seemed, which was how I justified the higher price to myself in the first place AND was facing the prospect of having to depend on folks we never even met to do the repairs and represent our interests from 3 1/2 hours away.  So we pulled out of the deal and walked away, thinking it was forever.

But 5 months later when the place dropped in price we looked through it again and the repairs looked really good, and we made a full price offer at the lower price and it was accepted.  Honestly at that point I think we could have offered a little less and still been accepted, but I thought that would be jerky.

[DawnM]

9 minutes ago, Carol in Cal. said:

I would like to add—we were not jerks about this.

The reasons the deal fell apart were real and bad.  The seller had neglected the property after moving out, and because of an oversight on her part the pipes froze and ruined both bathrooms.  Then our realtor decided to become a teacher, and passed off the deal to an associate we had never met.  We were in escrow when all this happened, and the price we were paying was a bit higher than what I thought the market value was anyway, and I became very uncomfortable that the place was not as well maintained as it seemed, which was how I justified the higher price to myself in the first place AND was facing the prospect of having to depend on folks we never even met to do the repairs and represent our interests from 3 1/2 hours away.  So we pulled out of the deal and walked away, thinking it was forever.

But 5 months later when the place dropped in price we looked through it again and the repairs looked really good, and we made a full price offer at the lower price and it was accepted.  Honestly at that point I think we could have offered a little less and still been accepted, but I thought that would be jerky.

 

I wasn't taking it that you were jerks at all.

DH had a deal with buying an open bed trailer.  It was (I am putting random numbers in here as I don't remember exact, but it is close) $2000 on CL.  DH went to look, offered $1600, the guy turned him down.

Two weeks later he listed in on ebay for $1800.  DH bid $1500 and got it!  Not only did the guy go below the original offer, but he had to pay ebay for their cut!

It was a bit awkward, but we still have the trailer!