4 TIPS FOR MAKING AN OFFER ON A HOUSE

In today’s sellers’ market, most buyers only have one shot at making an impression. While offering more money is a safe way to land at the top of the list, it is not the only thing that sellers look at, specially in a situation where there are a number of similar, competing offers. The tips below go over ways to make your offer stand out and give you a good shot at landing the house of your dreams.

1| GET PRE-APPROVED

This is probably the next best thing to a cash offer. Coming to the negotiating table with a mortgage pre-approval letter in hand shows the seller that you are serious about buying the house and have the support from your mortgage broker or bank to borrow a specific amount. For an extra leg up, you can even ask your lender to call the seller or the seller’s listing agent to share the level of confidence they have in your mortgage pre-approval.

2| PAY FOR EXTRAS YOURSELF

A seller might value you taking some of the load off of them by offering to pay some of the extra fees that crop up. For example, you could offer to cover some of the closing costs, HOA dues, or home warranty.

3| BE FLEXIBLE

If you’re not able to bring a top-dollar offer to the table, you can make up for it with timeline flexibility. Whether your seller wants to close in 30 days, or if they need 90 days to get their affairs in order, if you’re flexible to meet their needs, you’re likely to beat out other buyers with more strict timelines.

4| WRITE A PERSONAL LETTER

Cheesy? Yes. Sometimes really successful? Also yes. According to Forbes, a heartfelt letter might be the difference between securing your dream home and losing it. Selling a home is both a financial and emotional transaction, but finance almost always will trump emotion. Not a lot of sellers will leave money on the table so a personal letter might not make up for a weak offer, but given two strong offers it might just tip the scale in your favor.

There are many other more delicate negotiation tactics that you can pursue to make your offer the most attractive one of the bunch, including offering escalator clauses, tweaking contingency clauses, and offering an amount above market value. When you partner with one of our experienced buyer agents, they’ll look at your specific situation and help you put together a bidding plan. With our help, you will get the home of your dreams in no time. Call us today at 608.957.2683 to start exploring your options.