Every single day I see posts here about house not selling, multiple price reductions and no buyers are interested. This is my response to that, as a seller who can't afford to take the 10% equity loss when we're moving internationally to an even hotter market than here.

I live in a VHCOL area 8 miles from the beach in SoCal. We put our house on the market in October last year, and our agent let us know by the time we were ready to list, that the market had fallen off a cliff in just 6 weeks. We got 2 offers, both 10% lower than comps and our unit had major upgrades compared to recently sold units.

So we pulled it and decided to do a total facelift before re-listing. But, the market has fallen even more. We're out $20k in renovations and 6 months of my labor making the place turn key ready. There's been no rebound. So, I'm just waiting it out while doing renovations and refinishing.

My mortgage is $1900 and my interest rate is 2.7% so why would I sell in such an abnormal market?

We're moving internationally but work remote so the option is there to wait, and if circumstances change and we have to sell before the market recovers, so be it.

If you can rent it out month to month or air BNB or take a savings hit and rent in your new location til your home sells, do it.

We had a neighbor list at $500k and it took him 3 years to sell the place, eventually going FSBO to an equity firm.

That house was promptly resold for $300k more 2 years later. As the song says, you gotta know when to hold em and know when to fold em.

Closing on a house in just over a week, and found out yesterday through applying for home owners insurance that the sellers did not disclose a claim for $100k (buying house for $940k) for water damage from a "leak" in the kitchen. It seems like they purposely did not disclose this because they did disclose a claim for the roof 10 years ago, but nothing about the water damage.

Everything I am seeing says sale/resale value goes down when there is water damage, but there was no discount on sales price. My insurance is also going to be $1,300 more per year due to this.

I am in love with this home. It is in the perfect area for me. The sellers have offered to pay for a mold inspection, but I feel like I am still going to be getting screwed by paying full price even if there is no mold.

Should I cut my losses? Ask to reduce the price? Please give me all of your advice and opinions.

I've seen tons of D.R. Horton, Lennar, or other mass home builder-related posts on here that seem to just say "DR Horton bad" without addressing the actual root of the problem. Having worked in the heavily regulated pharmaceutical industry / GMP manufacturing, It's clear to me that there needs to be some systemic change that incentivizes quality while maintaining quantity.

The main argument against this is that increased costs will be transferred to the buyers when they're looking for affordable housing, and that increased regulations will hurt buyers. I think this is wrong, buyers are already being hurt by the quality issues seen with mass home builders' products. D.R. Horton homes are cheaper than the broader market, however insurers are insuring them as if they will last 30 years. Buyers may end up spending much more on repairs to the crappy homes, and possibly litigation, over the first 5 years of buying a home which they didn't anticipate. With improved regulations, builders will need to rethink how they operate, such as requiring contractors to have certain credentials, be trained and qualified, stay up to date on training, and use materials from qualified suppliers. This may result in a higher initial price of home, however the improved quality will reduce costs over the lifetime of the home. And with a culture centered around continuous improvement, builders will introduce efficiencies and improvements in the building process while staying compliant. I've seen this in the pharmaceutical industry, where companies are constantly looking for ways to improve their processes by reducing cost of goods and turn-around time, in the face of ever-increasing regulatory scrutiny.

Another point I'd like to make is that as it currently stands, the burden of proof for quality issues is on the building inspector and the buyer. This is what the pharmaceutical industry calls "testing quality into the product," which has been proven time and time again to not work. The best processes have quality built into the process at the development stage and throughout the lifecycle of the process, by establishing control ranges for input parameters based on their known effects on critical quality attributes (CQAs). This is basically defining what actually matters for durability and control from day one. I think if this same strategy was applied in the mass home building industry, we'd see vast improvements to buyer satisfaction.

I know there are some issues with this strategy, such as the fact that there is a shortage of 4.7 million homes right now, and millions of buyers need homes today. I think it is imperative that we improve regulations despite this. If this pattern continues, I'd expect these same buyers to have spent the cost of their mortgage on repairs and litigation for a house that is still standing but full of problems. Insurers may raise premiums based on the track record of the builder, and banks will refuse to lend buyers the value of the home because they won't appraise for as much anymore. The quality issues will catch up with the builders, and with current regulations, buyers will be on the hook and the housing crisis will continue.

Mom and dad have passed on and we are in the process of clearing the estate. Without getting into specifics I'm super sad about having to sell the house but it's what needs done. I'm not gonna live there and renting isn't something I even remotely want to entertain.

The home is a rural house in NW PA. While not on a back road it's definitely in the middle of Amish country. I was considering leaving a note for 2x purposes. One, to wish them the best of luck in the future and that I would think mom and dad would be happy. Mom and Dad loved having kids around the place, and the young couple buying the home have 3x young kids.

Also I want to detail specifics on how "I think" things are setup as far as the heating works for the house (house has an outside wood boiler and a propane furnace). Additionally wanted to mention things about the neighbors (good stuff) and also some close family friends that are Amish that might be able to render construction services etc if they would need.

Property was also an active farm for 50+ years. On the wooded part of the property I know there has to be some wire fencing still out there that was never reclaimed. I don't recall there being a part of the sellers disclosure for this type of thing. I would hate for somebody to go ripping through there on a ATV and find that the hard way.

Thoughts/opinions?

It’s a designated monument and a contributor to a historic district with a very stringent design review board.
Every repair would have to be approved by the city and the district board. Adu law is strong in my state, but the board can make me build in historical style, not visible from the street, and 750 square feet max. It’s also in a hillside zone, which triggers really expensive foundations compared to flat land. It is filled in to look flat though, and has been that way for a century.

There’s small 1910 barn that has a permit on file, but the house itself is too old to have an original permit on file.

It needs: 750k in “conforming” work done to it in order to max out its value at 900k. Even getting it habitable would be a tall order. It has a 6 foot tall brick foundation with almost no mortar left in the joints. One of the corbeled chimney tops is about to roll off the tall and very steep roof. A specialized historic mason will have to do all of that. Much of the 30 windows and exterior wood detailing need extensive repairs and:or replicas made. Lead paint chipping off everywhere, huge holes in the tar shingle roof. Electrical and plumbing need total replacement-lots of surface mount work that isn’t working. City will require me to move it all into the walls.

I think it’s clear we need to find an eccentric historic house benefactor buyer bc I suspect most investors would look at this something like this:

Value of home fully restored - cost to repair - negative historical premium* - risk premium - profit margin = value now

This would make it worth less than zero, but then equilibrium forces would act on it, settling the final value at X.

* the historical protections make it worth less than raw land to investors since raw land can be built to a high density in this area. If this lot weren’t historic, a developer could build 10 units by right.

I live in a small rural town in the South (US) where the housing market is nearly nonexistent. At any given moment, there might be 10-15 houses listed on Zillow, usually a couple of modest homes close to my price range, and then the rest are all insanely nice homes way out of my price range. Got tired of the renting charades around here, contacted a realtor i know, she put me with her lender, got pre-approved, found a house i loved within my budget, put in an offer at $10k under asking price with them paying closing costs, so it ended up being $3k under asking price.

Had the inspection done today and it didnt go great. No real structural issues to speak of, but lots of issues in the basement when it comes to plumbing, pipes, ductwork, leaks, moisture down there. Also is going to need a new roof very soon, and a new hot water heater.

That said, im still interested in pursuing it, but i have no idea the correct course of action. I have a feeling that the sellers probably arent going to go much lower and are wanting to just sell as is, which would result in me probably having to put at least $20k into the fixes (just guessing the amount off the top of my head).

Where do I go from here? Im in a really desperate rental situation where I NEED to get out of here as soon as I can, and I dont want that desperation to cause me to make a rash decision. But even with said issues, the house is very livable and is in a better shape than what im living in now. At the same time, I dont want to sign up for a money put. All of this is new to me and I really am at a loss of where to go from here. Thanks for any advice or input.

In Georgia. I have several acres of property for sale. It has been in my family for almost 200 years so the last survey was done in 1890. Obviously the new survey came back at 3 acres less than the tax assessors records indicated.

Before we had the survey completed, a buyer made an offer and we went under contract. When we found out about the acreage being 3 acres less. 47 as opposed to 50, my realtor called to let me know and said that due to that, the price would be reduced. I understand the reasoning. I was just shocked as I was given a new number as if it was just what happens and I had no say in a price adjustment.

A couple weeks later after additional difficulties, I texted my realtor and asked if I had signed anything agreeing to the reduced price. His answer was no. I asked if the buyer had asked for a reduced price.

He then replied to tell me that after the survey showing the lesser acreage, the buyer’s agent reached out to him with a new number. And then he asked them to agree to something slightly higher - the number he’d called me with and spoken to me as if it just is how this works.

I would like to know if I am crazy for feeling absolutely infuriated to find out - only by asking - that the buyers agent had submitted a different price offer that he never told me about and took it upon himself to just tell them another number.

I feel like it was very out of line for him to negotiate anything on my behalf without my knowledge and especially to then present it to me as the new price existed because that is just how the contract adjusts due to lesser acreage. I did not list the property by acre.

I’m having extreme trust issues after finding out about the negotiation that I should have been involved in. I don’t feel comfortable with this realtor any longer, but I am under contract with him until January 11th.

Thoughts? Even if the thoughts are just saying that I shouldn’t be uneasy working with him moving forward. I don’t want to be overly specific, but the adjustment he negotiated without my involvement was tens of thousands less than the original contract.

Can we start a petition for all listings on Zillow, Realtor, etc to include a floor plan?

My husband and I are the early-ish stages of house hunting for our next home for our of family of 5. Layout is one of the most important factors in if a home will work for us or not- even more than square footage. I don’t want to waste anyone’s time by looking at houses that aren’t functional for us. Why isn’t this the norm?

Long story short, house is probably going to appraise for 847k. We are accepting an 820k offer with no commission, as-is (an agent is buying and repping themselves). Another potential buyer would probably get us to pay 2% fees on their end anyway, so in my mind it’s more like an 836k offer. Theres nothing wrong with our house, a few things could use updating but nothing major anyway, so concessions for another buyer would be at most annoying and nickle-diming but minimal. It also costs me 2k a month to hang onto this house because we already moved.

My agent did not like this buyer because their initial offer was pretty insulting (805k, 3% commission, 60 day close, 25 day inspection period, 45 mortgage) but we offered our terms 825k 0%, as is, 30 day close, 10 day inspection, 30 mortgage. They accepted everything but countered 820k. I’m thinking we didn’t do too bad, let’s wash our hands of it but my agent thinks we could do better. This is our first and only offer, btw. We’ve been listed for 60 days and welcomed all offers.

Let’s be clear tho, I pay 2k a month to hang onto it, potentially have my time wasted, argue about concessions, pay buyers agent fees, etc. to MAYBE get a better offer or I can let it go for close to the same? FWIW, we are losing money on the house (around 40-50k). Bought 3.5 years ago, our needs have changed completely, had to move, and we put a decent amount of work into it thinking it would be our forever home so I know my agent is also keeping that in mind.

Idk tell me if I’m being foolish?

Hi there,

We are trying to sell our house in a popular city but the market has slowed greatly in the last year. Our house also has a few quirks that I never had an issue with but seems to be putting buyers off. The price has dropped by 55K in total but still no offers from regular ppl.

Here's the thing, we are getting a steady stream of seller financed offers from companies.

Here's an example:

Offer Summary

 • Purchase Price: $350,000.00

• Cash to Seller at Closing: $10,500.00

• Listing Agent Commission: $10,500.00

• Existing Loan to Be Taken over Subject-To: $235,425.00

• Seller Finance (7-Year Balloon): $93,575.00

• Monthly Seller Financing Note Payment: $259.93

• Total Net to Seller: $104,075.00

Key Terms

 • 30-day closing (flexible if needed)

• EMD: 1% to be deposited to the title company

• Structure designed to maximize net proceeds to your client

Obviously we would counter with better numbers but I wanted to gauge people's reaction to these. Are they an absolute no-go? Or would you consider if it's the only option?

AI suggests a real estate lawyer could draw up various papers (Promissory Note, Personal Guarantee, Hazard Insurance Requirements, and a few others) that would help protect us.

I finally got my house under contract after 9 grueling months due to my agent overpricing it, being on a busy road, and having a narrow driveway that backs into traffic. I was so excited, even though it seemed I might have to move into a short term rental since, as luck would have it, nothing was available that I wanted. Every house I hoped for went under contract while my house was on the market. Oh well, at least I was finally selling mine.

Then, I found out on inspection that I had 26K worth of foundation work + 8400 in other items, totaling about 35K in repairs to my house. It has to be done, sucks big time,but I accepted it.

I found a great house at the final hour, and got it under contract, contingent on the sale of my home. All was moving forward, till I found out that the foundation contractor, doing work on my house, had a set back and wouldn’t be finished with necessary work for two weeks after my closing date.

My agent seemed upset, and indicated this put me in a position to lose the new house, which I would be paying cash for with the sale of my house. The sellers of the new house also have about 40K in repairs that came up on inspection, but I negotiated dropping the price of the house, as I will be paying cash.

I was thinking of approaching my buyer to ask if they will close on time though the work won’t be completed for about 10 days after closing, but all the work will be paid for. My agent thinks this buyer won’t go for it because they have been very anal and picky about repairs. They will also be using a lender.

My second thought is that we approach the sellers of the new house and explain the dilemma, asking them to close about two weeks later. We’re in a balanced market and I think I’m the best buyer that the sellers of the new house have, especially since it won’t appraise due to the repairs required, but I am willing to do myself with the price reduction.

My questions are: Why is my agent so alarmed? I would think these things happen all the time. Also, are there any solutions that I haven’t thought of? The whole ordeal has been so stressful, I’m not sure I’m thinking straight and would appreciate input, especially from folks who’ve been through something like this. Thanks in advance.

Do well maintained whole house generators (like a generac) add to the value of your house when selling? Natural gas hookup in central texas.

My parents want to sell me and my husband my childhood home. We would move to MI from Denver.

They are wanting to gift us equity as much as a 20% down payment so that we wouldn’t deal with PMI.
The only problem is our current lease in Denver is not up until end of March and my parents new place is ready by end of Sept so they want us to purchase in October, as they basically want the sell of their old house to go towards the new house.

I know I need to ask our landlord about options of breaking our lease early but I’m worried we will be told we cannot break the lease and will be essentially paying for two places for 5 months. I know my parents are doing a solid by doing this sell so that we are not using any realtors and gifting a down payment/equity but I feel like my husband and I are potentially going to be broke for a year if this is all how it works out. I need to breach closing costs, doing inspections of the house, but really want to avoid double rent and I don’t know how we will if our landlord says tough luck you signed the lease.

I know the management company really doesn’t like transferring leases in cold months as well. Trying to figure out a way for both parties to be happy here. Thank you for any advice and input!

Listen I realize my title is a bit melodramatic because at the end of the day this is just one person’s experience, but if you read other accounts in this sub you will certainly find a pattern. And I want to be clear that I don’t believe the “scam” involves the service fee, because that’s very clear upon initial offer. Predatory and targeted toward desperate folks? Perhaps. But not a scam. Here is how they get you after acceptance of the initial offer…

Repair addendum

This is the most well-documented aspect in this sub. Language in the due diligence inspection report will be taken out of context, exaggerated, or otherwise used to diminish the offer without transparency. It does not matter if you disclosed and photographed the issues when you created your home’s profile on the app (which should be accounted for in the initial offer). They will not provide an itemized list of repairs deemed necessary or how much they estimate the cost to be. It’s just a number. Through great effort (see next section), I was partially successful in negotiating on what I believed to be bogus repairs. But not fully.

Being unreachable

It is exceptionally difficult to speak to a person. They will take days to respond, making it almost impossible to negotiate. I believe this is by design. They lure sellers in with the promise of a quick close, and then create an artificial sense of urgency by just… not answering the phone. I was completely unable to reach my Opendoor rep, even after trying via phone, voicemail, email and text message. I had to escalate my inspection review multiple times through the technical support number, because even though they will quote you an hour wait time, they do actually pick up. The app says that step takes 1-2 business days, but even after escalating twice it still took more than a week. When I finally spoke to the person handling my sale they claimed they had been trying but unable to reach me due to issues with their phones. Yeah right.

Bad faith closing estimate

Here’s the real doozie. Prior to signing an initial offer, the app emphasizes a price “after all fees and costs” and provides an estimate of closing costs. If you’ve bought/sold a house, you understand why closing costs are necessarily an estimate at this stage, those can’t be fully known at the onset. That estimate is supposedly based on the closing costs of similar and recent home sales in your area. A seemingly reasonable method. However, Opendoor uses language in their contract addendum that makes the full cost of transfer and recordation tax the responsibility of the seller. This is NOT the convention in my state, where those taxes are ordinarily split between buyer and seller. So their closing estimate is based on parameters they choose not to follow! When I saw that language I asked my Opendoor rep to confirm the closing estimate I received in the app, which they did. When I asked more questions about how the addendum would impact closing, I was directed to the title company. It was also very difficult to get someone to respond at the title company, but after several days of hounding they did generate a net sheet for me. Lo and behold, the total cost to me at closing would be TWICE what Opendoor estimated because I was fully responsible for the tax under the terms of the addendum. This was not a rounding error. It was a grift.

Had I not doggedly pursued each of these gotchas it’s very likely the full impact would not have been revealed until just before close. At that point people may have plans in place that cannot be changed. They may not have a choice but to accept terms thousands or even tens of thousands less than they were originally offered. This is not a company that does business honestly and I would recommend avoiding.

Our house is currently on the market and has had many showing requests which have been great! However; I work from home, have two kids, and 3 large dogs. Getting everyone out of the house and staying gone is no easy task.

I would say 8/10 of the last showings have been late or 2 with no shows completely. And by late, I’m talking 15-30+ minutes late. If not for my ring camera, I would have gone home and been sitting unprepared when they finally show up thinking they have already came and went! I have had to reach out my agent for him to reach out to them to confirm they are still coming. Not one of them have reached out first to communicate running late or cancelled showing.

This can’t be normal? Buyers agents need to be more considerate of seller’s time.

Thank you for coming to my rant and staying the entire time.

Editing to say that they are scheduling a time block for 15-30 min. When I say they are late, I mean late past the time block. Just now, showing was scheduled at 12-12:30. Agent finally showed at 12:36 after my agent finally reached out to see if they were even coming. Meaning they will now be in my house way past 12:30. This has been our experience the entire time the house has been showing with the exception of a handful.

Offer was full asking price. No contingencies, no inspection, 9% down for earnest money deposit

We accepted. Still no signed contract weeks later.

Now they're asking to put down only 2%, and maybe do an inspection.

Should I just move on, or is this typical behavior? Feels like they're not serious

So this is my (36f) first time looking to buy a house. I have a child (5m) and my husband passed away 2 years ago. We currently rent a house from my in-laws but they’ve been not so nice to us. The day my husband died my MiL said “you can stay here as long as you like” then the next day she came back and said “I misspoke”. Because my FiL is an asshole.

I’m a teacher as well and when he learned childcare was free to teachers in our district, he wanted to raise my rent by 75%. My husband made 6 figures but I don’t. And they’re about to put a timeline on me leaving because “he just doesn’t want to be a landlord anymore”. Can’t buy this house because our neighborhood doesn’t have any kids and I want us to live somewhere with community. That was just the background..

My realtor is a wonderful human. I used to work with her at a school and she left teaching to pursue real estate. But I’m just not very knowledgeable about things and I think she’s maybe not doing the right things?

We’ve been looking for new builds for incentives, I made sure that she knows I want a community center in the neighborhood. But she’s taken me to a few new communities that will not include amenities. And I’m like why did I even look at this if I can’t have it?

Then I found a resell house I REALLY loved. It was in a great neighborhood with a big community center that throws events and there are so many kids my son’s age so he could grow up with friends playing in the neighborhood.

The problem was.. it was WAY above market value and I wanted to send a low-ball offer with a letter about my situation. Tbf it was $80k less than asking. I will have about $150k-$200k to put down from my husbands’ life insurance and I’ve been told this is a good thing. But she refused to send a low-ball offer.

I just thought, what’s the worst that can happen? They say no? But she wouldn’t. She said it was “disrespectful” to do that. Is that true?

Does it look bad on her if we make a low-ball offer? Is that why she told me she wouldn’t? I was so upset and took a month off looking. The seller took the house off the market so I’m like.. what if we had sent the offer? Would they have sold to me?

I don’t really know what to do. I also asked if she would contact a seller who is renting a house to see if they would be interested in selling, but she wouldn’t do that either. Is this normal?

Am I being swindled or is this regular realtor things? I just thought she would fight harder for me. The universe screwed me and my son over, so I will be using that to try and get a better offer. I’d just love some feedback.

ETA: I now understand that writing a note to a seller is not a good idea. Thank you for all of the kind words of advice some of you have given. To the others who are making negative comments about my “sob story” of the death of my husband, I hope you never have to experience a loss like this in your life. Please be kind, you don’t know what everyone is going through.

I’m selling my house. This isn’t the first house I’ve sold. I feel like every time, either buying or selling, each party tries to extract all they can out of the other party. And I get it, but I really wish people would at least consider being “good people.”

I’m so over it. Never doing this again.

Yes, my office regularly gives closing gifts. It’s for a place less than $100,000 so nothing too fancy. What are some good ideas? It’s a couple that just had a baby.

I’ve had many many showings of my house and this was a new situation. Realtor texted my agent asking for my wifi info. We are in a rural area with no service so I didn’t think much of it. I arrive home 5 minutes after the allotted hour and realtor vehicle is still there. Only car in my driveway. I leave as a courtesy and come back 15 minutes later, she’s still there. I decided to park because I work from home and had been gone for an hour and a half at this point. She comes out a few minutes later alone and drove off. Is it normal for realtors to linger alone for so long after a showing?