Counter offers when selling

7 years ago

last modified: 7 years ago

I'm probably preaching to the choir here, but selling a home is so frustrating! My house has been on the market about 6 weeks or so and been under contract twice for the majority of that time. When I listed, I got several offers, but the one I accepted fell through because of an inspection issue that has since been resolved. That took about 15 days. The second time, the buyers' financing fell through after about 12 days.

It's been back on the market 2 days and I've gotten 2 offers but they're terrible! One is an FHA buyer that offered me $5000 under list, with $5000 in closing assist and $1500 in repair concessions. And the other is a conventional loan that offered me $2500 over list but wants $9000 back in closing assist. I'm in a sellers market and there's very low inventory in my neighborhood (one house priced $15000 below in terrible condition and one house priced $15000 above with much bigger square footage and a pool). I'm supposed to have a call with my realtor later today, but should I ask for best and final offers or counter back to the conventional offer and reject the FHA offer?

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Comments (4)

cpartist
7 years ago
Make sure the conventional one has their financing in place and then counter back.

Basically the conventional one is offering you $6500 off your list price. If houses are priced in the $150,000 range, then yes that is a lot of money. However if you're selling price is closer to the $1,000,000 mark, then that's a drop in the bucket and not worth haggling over.
Melissa Roberts
Original Author
7 years ago
The houses in my area are between $150k-$200k so $5000 is a substantial discount.
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Denita
7 years ago
last modified: 7 years ago
Ask your Realtor to give you the details of the comparable sales in your neighborhood. Do most of those sales include a seller contribution toward buyer's closing costs? This will give you an idea of where you are in the marketplace. If it is a first time homebuyer's type neighborhood, it isn't unusual to have a seller's contribution. The offers don't sound terrible to me, they sound like good starting offers for your home.

There are a couple of ways to counter as you mention in your post.

In multiple offer situations, if there is no clear front runner, then it is common to counter with "highest and best". You may be surprised at what you will receive in the second go around. I typically give several days (4 days is common) for a highest and best response and announce it in the MLS verbage. This brings out other buyers so you can truly select the best offer among the offers made. Typically there is a rush of showings and offers once the "highest & best" with a deadline is posted. I prefer this method to the one below. It usually results in higher net proceeds to the seller IME.

Or, you can choose the strongest offer to counter. You and your agent can examine each offer for strengths and weaknesses and go from there.
homechef59
7 years ago
Given that you are in a seller's market, the failed offers were through no fault of yours, and you have two less than stellar offers on the table that have not been countered, I'd strongly consider following Denita's advice. It may be an unfamiliar technique to your particular agent. If it is, make their broker deal with the details of conducting a "highest and best offer" process.

Making certain that these two buyers well qualified for financing would be a priority. Your two buyers need to bring more to the table. It's not that you are wanting more than list price, it's that you need a qualified buyer to pay close to list price. You want them at the closing table with a good check in hand. At the least, I'd have my agent advise both of them that there are multiple offers. How badly do they want it?