Once you find the home you want to buy, the next step is to write an offer–which is not as easy as it sounds.
Your offer is the first step toward negotiating a sales contract with the seller. Since this is generally just the beginning of negotiations, you should put yourself in the seller’s shoes and imagine his or her reaction to everything you include in the offer. Your goal is to get what you want, and imagining the seller’s reactions will help you attain that goal.
The offer is much more complicated than simply coming up with a price and saying, “This is what I’ll pay.”
In an offer to purchase real estate, you include not only the price you are willing to pay, but other details of the purchase as well. These include how you intend to finance the home, your down payment, who pays what closing costs, what inspections are performed, timetables, whether personal property is included in the purchase, terms of cancellation, repairs you want performed, which professional services will be used, when you get physical possession of the property, and how to settle disputes should they occur.
Buying a home is a major event for both the buyer and the seller. The seller makes plans based on your offer. In the time it takes to write an offer, you are making decisions that affect how you live for the next several years, if not the rest of your life. The seller is going to review your offer carefully, because it also affects how he or she lives the rest of their life.
All of this sounds dramatic. But, every real estate book or article you read says the same thing. They all say it because it is true.
For more information, please call me at 304-822-4350.
Until next time,
Sandra Hunt, Broker
ABR, ABRM, AHWD, CRS, GRI, SFR, SRES
Hunt Country Properties
