Tuesday, July 2, 2013

Hunting Houses: The Waiting Game

The wait during the house hunting process can feel so agonizingly long.  Although the below events happened within a short time period, it felt like an eternity to me.

Saturday was our first outing to see homes.  
  - All three homes that we saw were similar in layout (one that we have seen on and off the market since 2011 and really loved).
  - 2 houses were quickly ruled out, but one was a real winner.



Sunday, our realtor Iris schedules another showing.
  - This time we spend a full hour in the house to get a good second look.  
  - My parents come along so I can get their opinion on the house as well.
  - Iris provides some comps, what she feels a good offer price would be as well as rough estimates for closing costs.
  - We have some questions for the seller's agent, phone messages are left and emails are sent.
  - And we wait.

Monday, a back and forth between the agents.
  - Documents on foundation repairs may be located in the house, but the sellers are currently across the country.
  - Iris learns the reason why the last deal fell through -VA appraisal came in low.
  - We talk it through and decide to put in an offer at 89.8% of the list price (the property is overpriced as evident from the last deal falling through on appraisal and the house being on the market for 72 days in a market where nearby houses are selling in 4 and 8 days)
  - I attempt to sleep through the night without much luck

Tuesday, spend the entire day wondering if the sellers are going to come down from the list price
  - Around 8:30 pm the Sellers counter with 3 conditions and an offer at 93.3% of the list price
  - We talk the conditions over with Iris as well as financial options with our mortgage broker to determine what we might want to counter with
  - Decided to sleep on it (I doubt they're up waiting for our response at 10 pm)

Wednesday, discuss our counter offer plan one more time before school/work
  - We decide to counter at noon at 92.9% of the list price, agree to 2 of their conditions, counter on the other by asking to pay half instead of full amount, but ask for seller's concession
  - And we wait.

Thursday, still waiting on the seller's response to our counter
  - Thankfully I had a couple of big work meetings to keep my mind off of the waiting
  - Finally hear back from the sellers at 7 pm, who notify us of the lowest net amount they will take (which is 92.9%)
  - We sleep on it

Friday
  - We submit another counter which increases our offer to include the concession and still meet the sellers net amount.
  - Seller's agent comes back to say the higher amount may not work (I'm guessing based on previous appraisal).
  - We decided to do the offer at 92.9% without any seller's concessions.
  - You know the drill...more waiting

Saturday
  - Sellers finally send back the signed contract
  - We've Bought A House!!

Now I'm trying to keep my excitement in check until we have the inspection and appraisal completed. I really can't believe that this all went down within a week!  I never thought that we would have a house hunter-ish experience, seeing 3 houses and putting in an offer on 1.  A part of me is sad that we didn't look at more houses, but after seeing this one we knew it was the one.

How many houses did you check out before putting in an offer?

10 comments:

  1. Whoo hoo! Congratulations! We started looking earlier than we were ready to buy, to get a feel for what options we might have. By the point that we were SERIOUSLY looking, we looked at three, put in an offer, and it was done. So I think your experience might not be too far off from normal. I hope the rest of it goes smoothly (if it's anything like our experience, you'll have some fun moments of panic, but it will all work out in the end!).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you!! I always wondered about those house shows that have buyers who have been looking for months at numerous houses, and if it's just for the show or maybe that times are changing.

      Delete
  2. Congrats!! I love that you negotiated, I wish we would have done more of that, I want to feel as if I got a good deal :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I agree on wanting to feel like we got a good deal! It's funny because I feel like we didn't negotiate enough since we couldn't get some sellers concession out of them. Oh well, I'm just happy that we didn't have to pay list price or over in the current market with limited inventory and higher demand.

      Delete
  3. Congratulations!!! I hope everything works out!

    ReplyDelete
  4. oh wow, congratulations!!! fingers crossed for the rest of the process going smoothly!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Congrats you guys!!! It is so stressful to have to wait so long for the negotiations to happen, but I'm so glad it worked out for you. Fingers crossed all of the inspections and appraisals go well!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Congratulations! I hope the rest of the process goes quickly and smoothly for you two! We only looked at our house, and then bought it LOL We knew it was the one!

    ReplyDelete
  7. OMG congrats!!! How exciting. I can't wait to see how you're going to spruce it up! It's a gorgeous place!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Congratulations! The home buying process is a tough one, but it seems that you've had it pretty easy so far! We checked out over 60 houses in person, and over 1000 online before finally offering on the one we now own. It was quite the process, and I'm sure that after reading this, you'll be very happy that you didn't have to go through what we did!

    ReplyDelete