When the listing agent says, "We've accepted another offer"
If you've been in this industry long enough and have worked with numerous buyers, you've probably heard those same four words of death. Immediately following, your hand gripped the phone a little tighter, your eyes closed, and your mouth formed into a grim position as you imagined the disappointment of your buyers. However, I've learned oftentimes, it's not over until it's over! Just last week I had further confirmation of this when I inquired of an offer sent a week prior to a listing agent in a multiple offer situation. We had heard nothing back and I suspected that it wasn't in our favor. However, the near-death experience went a little something like this:
Listing agent: I'm sorry but we've accepted another offer.
Me : Oh darn. By chance did you communicate the seller acceptance and inform the other side yet?
Listing agent: Well no, we are getting ready to do that. I'm waiting for seller signatures now.
Me: Oh GREAT, so the listing is still actually active. [NOTE my total disregard once I knew the seller hadn't signed off and officially accepted the other offer]. If you'll just allow me [insert listing agent's name] to recap again why my buyers are so strong, I'm sure you and your sellers will reconsider. If it turns out the other buyers are the far superior choice overall, well then [insert listing agent's name] we'll have no choice but to concede as I truly understand the seller must do what they deem is in their best interest. [The following was stated in matter-of-fact type of way, no pushiness and most certainly no desperation]:
- We submitted a fantastic offer price, higher than asking but matching comps enough where appraisal shouldn't be an issue. The sellers will more than likely not have to renegotiate a lower price later with my buyers because of a grossly inflated offer price tactic, which as you and I know happens so often in multiple offer situations like this.
- Both of my buyers have outstanding credit scores being [insert high credit scores here] which of course yousaw on the first page of their FICOs. Neither side of the buying team has shown a track record of possible irresponsibility, simply by pattern they are not likely do anything rash to jeopardize the escrow in any way.
- My buyers do not NEED closing costs. As you and the seller have witnessed with their proof of funds, their finances are strong and the lenders and underwriters will most likely see that as well. Although they are FHA, they are not likely to have to scrape up any of the closing cost money or need to get any last minute gift letters from family to close. **I hear a grunt from the listing agent letting me know that is a point of concern regarding other buyers.**
- My buyers know the area and will be buying here, it's simply a matter of whether or not it will be your listing and believe me, they would LOVE for it to be your listing.
- 30 days to close, using direct lender. One that I'm sure you recognize as being very reputable with an outstanding track record of timely closings. [If she didn't know, I reiterated it!]
Listing agent: Wow ...I'm sorry Andi was it?
Me: Yes, Andi Grant representing [buyers' names].
Listing agent: Ok Andi, let me call the sellers to discuss and see if some of the great points you've mentioned will sway them. I'll call you back and let's cross our fingers. ("Let's" meaning "Let us." In other
words the listing agent would be fighting for our offer now because it looked the best in terms of a seamless closing for her seller at a fair price).
Listing agent (not even 15 mins later): The seller wants to work with you guys! We'll get the paperwork together and send back shortly.
When you look at what I recapped, it wasn't anything out of the norm. But in LA, where agents can sometimes be spread out 30 - 60 miles away and where offers are submitted electronically, there isn't always a chance to hand deliver and personally speak up your clients to the other side. So although I was told there was another acceptance, it didn't mean in the circumstances we had to accept it. Also you will note, that I often used the terms "more than likely" because I would still be negotiating in my buyer's favor until I handed them the keys. Far too often we think because the "fat lady has sung" that it's over. But maybe she is still in the dressing room and the doors are wide open. It's not over until it's over!
If you need a hard working Realtor and someone who has strong negotiating skills, do not hesitate to call Andi Grant at 310-508-4354 and I'll be more than happy to work hard for you!
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You have tenacity and it worked for your clients - but I still don't understand why the seller didn't understand those points when they were reviewing all the offers. Didn't their agent fully discuss all the offers with them?
Sounds like you know YOUR job but not so sure the listing agent knew THEIR job! I've had some buyer agents that tried to reiterate their buyers offer after a decision was made but ultimately, what good would that do if I've already discussed all the offers with the seller (who I work for)? The only time I could see this working well is if you were asking to present the offer to the seller yourself (with listing agent present of course).
Hey Margaret, I believe they simply looked at highest offer price, skimmed over the rest to make sure it was simply "acceptable" without really looking to see what will go to close, as some will do.
Ron - you'd be surprised! One of my profile testimonials posted here is one from a broker who was also the seller. He also changed his mind and went with us after we talked. Demonstrating quiet professionalism and assurance to the other side regarding getting the deal through to close goes a long way. Also like I said, the distances will not always allow for person-to person meetings here, so bringing some type of humanity to the names on the offer helps IMO.
Andi - Way to go! You are the perfect example of what an agent should be doing for their buyers. Nicely done! If that direct lender drops the ball let me know. We close clean loans in 10 days.
Good for you! You handled it as though you were sitting at the table with the sellers, which would be the best position as a buyer's agent. Glad you got through to the listing agent.
Way to go, Andi. I'd want you on my team. You do a good sell job!
And that's the way to get your deal accepted . . . WAY TO GO!!
That kind of negotiating and tenacity is what makes you a great agent. Those who hire you should consider themselves very lucky.
Andi - YOU GO GIRL!!! WHOO HOO!!! And that's the way it's done folks. Congrats on turning things around for you and your buyers.
Andi, that's awesome. I love your fighting spirit and the way you represent your clients so very well. They're lucky to have you on their side. Suggested!
Ooo Nevin, 10 days is great! Our past client Geraldine still sings your praises!
Mona - Me too! How impersonal and frustrating it must be for those who "remember when" MOST deals were done that way. Here in the LA Real Estate culture its the complete opposite.
Leah - I'd love to be ther too...if the weather were 80 degrees like this weekend will be. :)
Carla - THANKS! If you want to get to the front of the line, you have to walk up to it. :)
Awww thanks Melissa! I try!
Donne - the negotiating is really the exciting and strategic part.
Whoa! Thanks Lottie! I appreciate it!
That's true - it isn't over until the fat lady sings. She doesn't sing until the money is exchanged at the closing table...I wish buyers that are trying to beat up sellers would appreciate that more! If they understood that they were just one good competative offer away from being handed their walking papers - their behavior might change. But if they won't listen and continue to haggle over nickles and dimes - they can easily lose the home.
Great post. This proves never to give up! I'll have to try this sometime. Thanks for the great advice.
Lisa
Great job....you just never know so keep trying....Great negotiating points on your part. I remember just a few years back that if a property was flagged in the computer(mls) showing it was showing the home as backup, agents including myself would never show it to the buyer as a backup....but in today's market....if it is flagged and my buyer wants to see it we are going to see it and write an offer too....you just never know today.
Hi Andi - I bet a transparent bidding process would have eliminated all that stress for both you and your buyer (and the Seller for that matter). I guess I'm a little biased towards our system though. It really makes dealing with multiple offers much better for all parties involved. Buyer and their agent, seller and theirs. Have a great weekend.
Great job on working it and working it and not giving up. Sometimes we need to let out clients know about what goes on behind the scenes, so they know they chose the right agent.
Hi Andi, Wow, you pulled that one out at the eleventh hour, didn't you ! Nice job of hanging inthere and representing y7our buyers. Have a terrific weekend.
Ruthmarie - it can be tough, can't it? Nickel and dime stuff shouldn't ever be deal breaker material.
Lisa - Thanks and I'm glad it helped!
Dennis, Last year I had a buyer who was outbidded on a home she absolutely LOVED! She was single and competing against married doctors and lawyers in an award winning school didstrict area. She compared every home we looked at after that to that home. I finally said, OK, this isn't getting out of your system so lets just put in a backup offer just in case. Well wouldn't you know it! The original buyers couldn't close. We moved into 1st position and my buyer has been a VERY happy homeowner since last Sept. It was a lesson to me not to ever give up on my buyer's dreams on a great house.
Mitch - transparency could've. But alas we are not there yet. :)
Sandi - they really do appreciate it!
Bill - Phew!! You have a great weekend as well!
Andi....that is a great story!
Congratulations! You did a great job for your buyers and it paid off! We are also seeing some multiple offer situations - and then sometimes hearing back that even if we were not initially the first place offer, others fell by the wayside. So I tell my buyers not to give up til we see the sale has closed - you just never know how things will go these days.
Now that's how you do business!! I'm really impressed that you understand the mechanics of contract law as I've used the same sort of approach on several deals to get my clients into a deal they might have lost. Your example is a perfect illustration of how the expertise of a REALTOR can mean so much in a transaction. Good job!
Great job Andi!! It's called negotiating and it's what we get paid to do. You presented your case and won the property for your buyer. Perrfect.
I send a cover letter with those bullet points with every offer. I always follow up with a phone call as you would be amazed how many listing agents DO NOT even bother to read the letter.
Nicely done!
Hi Andie. It never ceases to amaze me that all too often the only thing looked at is the price being offered, and maybe the days to close and whether or not seller assist is involved. With the complexities of our contracts today, and the wide variety of financing out there sellers simply have to be exposed to the totality of the offer. And that includes commentary about the strength of the buyer (without jeopardizing confidentiality of course). Much better to do face-to-face but it just isn't always possible today. Great job Andie. Be sure the fat lady is exhausted, not merely out of the dressing room, before you give it up.!
"Best offer" is a combination of price and terms. It may also include the listing agent's confidence in the competence of the buyer's agent and her ability to get the buyer to the closing table.
Great job Andi!! I am sure your clients were thrilled with you and will be referring you as well.
Cyndi
Christine - thanks! sometimes we have to grab the pen and write our own ending!
Nancy - absolutely! See my note to Dennis in comment #18.
Bryan - thanks! I guess we have to keep yelling "Cut" as the directors, and rewriting scenes with a happier ending. :)
Bryant - thanks! It did feel like a win - the property is gorgeous and my buyers are estatic!
Justin - I'm a bullet person too! I make sure to highlight when I can because we have a lot of skimmers out there.
Vance - you nailed it! I think only 2 lines of a multi-document offer is actually looked at. Purchase price total and Seller to pay for ____.
Dave - It surprises me too that the offer sometimes isn't seen as an entire package: terms of offer, buyers, agent and lender. One of those 4 can totally throw the deal off.
Cyndi - the first time the buyer saw the house was after work when she was with a co-worker. She later told me that the coworker told her that if I could pull this one out of the hat, he most certainly would be using me. It really is a gorgeous home.
Andi - Ooo Nevin, 10 days is great! Our past client Geraldine still sings your praises! HARK! I hear angels singing!
Makes me miss the days of presenting offers directly...well done!
I am on the same page as several other comments here. The listing agent, if they were looking out for their client's best interests, should have already known several of these points. Way to go for sticking up for your buyers!
Andi -- You really nailed it! Super job. Your clients are so lucky to have you as their agent. I hope they realize that!
Andi, great job! I love the way you presented it. May I borrow it?
Chris, it would help me considerably! I think it would separate the men from the boys and the women from the girls as well. No hiding behind faxes and emails.
Catherine - it's like I mentioned in another comment. I think it might be that a lot of agents are simply looking at the price and closing costs asked and that's about it instead of looking at the entire offer package from offer terms, to buyers, to agent and lender.
Barbara - thanks so much... and they say that they do! :)
Anna - thank you and of course you can!
Andi, congratulations on your persistence and how fortunate that the agent on the other side gave you the time to explain the offer. Well done
Thanks for the post today. I enjoyed the read and have bookmarked it for the future.
Patricia/Seacoast NH & ME
Great job Andi...your persistance proved that it pays to "never say never". The seller's agent needs to be more focused on due diligence.
Sounds like a future client to me!!!
Cyndi
Terrific story Andi! I love the tenacity. Thanks for sharing....you go!
"never give up"
oh....I don't have to remind you of that, Andi! Great job!
Wow - I would not have thought that the Listing Realtor had not already considered all of the strengths of your Buyers' offer - will keep this in mind!
An excellent blog post and I thank you for sharing it!
Thanks for the encouraging story-it's good to hear.
This makes for a marvelous real estate bedtime tale. You achieved the Happy Ending for your clients. Notifications to the accepted offer are typically performed first, then to the subsequent offers that weren't accepted. I wonder why the agent deviated from the norm.
Andi, great post. Guess who reviewed all the previous offers..Great job...
You did a great job! Until all initials are made and offer communicated back to the other party, it's fair game. Many agents don't realize that.
Great points why a seller should accept your Buyer's offer. I use similar, but earlier in the negotiations - usually when following up on an offer to confirm it was received, and especially in multiple offer "highest and best" situations where over market offers that don't appraise are a risk.
I also mention that the Buyer is represented and supported by a team of experienced full time professionals. The transactions that go smoothest are those where I have a good rapport with the agent on the other side.
In NC, back-up offers require the primary buyer names and closing date. Adding a back-up offer addendum will sometimes push out a weak primary if it has a wobble...and if it fails because of one of the reasons I argued that our offer should be accepted in the first place, we have a strong chance of being the party at the closing table.
You did a great job for your buyers and I hope they appreciate you.
Kudos on your tenacity and quick thinking. You definitely are doing a great job for your buyers.
I think that the listing agent should have notified the first choice buyers first. Your timing and reaction is probably what got the job done.
Andi, there's a lot to be said for tenacity and persistence as the mark of a true professional. That is the way it's done folks.
Interesting post. I have been on both sides of the equation. What I liked about your position was that you were not pushy, but rather to the point. It makes a huge difference. No one likes to feel like they are being scolded or corrected. In this day and age it seems sometimes like people think they can do everything by email and not pick up the phone. A personal touch goes a long way.
Andi - the other buyers can be sorry they didnt have YOU representing them.
Congratulations Andi - I'm glad you made that call in the nick of time. It sounds like the next day it would have been too late.
Great post. Persistence and ability to pivot reflexively and seal the deal.
Hi Andi - well you did a great job - thumbs up to you. That's the way to conduct business and I hope your clients appreciated the effort you did in your representation of their best interest.
This is the sort of 'business' level we should all aspire to work to.
On a separate note - interesting in this situation that the listing agent did not precipitate a multiple counter situation with both buyers....
That's fantastic....and good for you! Sales 101 and it's basic because it works. Great job
Doesn't work so well in the Phoenix market. With foreclosures, the bank always verbally accepts followed up by sending bank addendums for the buyer to sign off on first. When a bank verbally accepts, that's it, they close it off no matter how good the offer
http://twitter.com/realtormatthew
Andi - in football, that would be called an interception! Nice way to turn the game around!
Way to go Andi! And I have to admit, I was trying to conceptualize how the listing agent originally "discussed" the offers with the seller. It's almost as if she just tossed them on the table and said, "let me know which one you like". You must of had a 'gut' feeling about this one, and your intuition certainly paid off. I do exactly what Justin (#23) does for every offer submitted...mainly so I don't have to rely on the agent to communicate the "highlights" of what makes this offer stand out. Still, it doesn't hurt to double check (regardless). ;-)
I was impressed, way to go...
I need to take negotiating lessons from you!
Andi, Great reminder that there's more to an offer than price!
This certainly is a great thing to do. Another thing I've found useful is to accompany every offer with a summary which has all the terms of the offer, the contact info for both agents, and whatever I know about who will be doing the loan, the inspections, etc. I always add the strong points of my buyer and whatever will "personalize" them for the seller when appropriate. I find that a lot of agents, rather than faxing or emailing the many pages that TN contracts contain, will send the seller the one-page summary. This means I'm sure the seller and their agent both see the strong points.
This certainly is a great thing to do. Another thing I've found useful is to accompany every offer with a summary which has all the terms of the offer, the contact info for both agents, and whatever I know about who will be doing the loan, the inspections, etc. I always add the strong points of my buyer and whatever will "personalize" them for the seller when appropriate. I find that a lot of agents, rather than faxing or emailing the many pages that TN contracts contain, will send the seller the one-page summary. This means I'm sure the seller and their agent both see the strong points.
I agree, if that agent didn't look closely in the first place he isn't doing a good job for his client! Yikes...
Super job! Way to go the extra mile!
I'll remember this one next time I'm in that situation
Very nice.
We often forget that Listing Agents have lives, and sometimes are overwhelmed with everything else going on, and they take the easy route out, just to maintain sanity.
Kudos to you for stepping in, and allowing them to understand that if they took your offer, they'd be working with a pro, which does help as well.
Andi-
I knew what the outcome would be-- or at least I though I did-- but I was still rooting for you and your clients. (Loved the image of you gripping "the phone a little tighter.")
Still awesome to go from 'THANKS, BUT NO THANKS' to 'WE WANT TO WORK WITH YOUR BUYERS' in less than an hour... Thanks to your tenacity!
Your message is a good reminder to us all that it's never over until after the closing and, if escrow monies have been set aside, it isn't always over then.
I had a prospective buyer of one of my REO listings who was extremely disappointed because a buyer who, was being represented by another agent, already had his offer accepted by the bank owner of the home. Sensing my prospective buyer's considerable disappointment, I suggested that he allow me to hold his back-up offer in case something went wrong. He agreed.
Neither of us expected for the deal that was already on the table to fall through. However, as the time-is-of-the-essence closing date was rapidly approaching the buyer who was under contract, his agent and broker and the buyer's attorney suddenly became "unavailable" and refused to take or return my calls. The closing date actually passed while all of those on the buying end of the contract continued to ignore my phone calls, email and FAX messages.
Only after the REO bank's attorney formally notified the buyer that his contractual rights to buy the property had been terminated did I receive a flurry of phone calls from all who had been ignoring my calls and messages. Incredibly, they were actually trying to save the deal. It was too late for them. I informed the buyer, who called me begging for another chance, that his agent, broker and attorney had not served his interests and that they were all responsible for his losing the deal.
Then I contacted my "buyer-in-waiting" who was thrilled to learn that his bid would now be accepted. He and his family are now the proud owners and residents of a home that needed a little work, but which he was able to acquire, even with repairs, for significantly less than its "fixed-up" market value.
Dramas like that can help all of us stay on our toes and remain interested in all of the twists and turns of the real estate business.
Andi - I love the "can do" attitude that pulled me through reading your post. Hope your persistence paid off for your buyers!
Sometimes it isn't over after the fat lady sings. Deals fall through all the time, even cash deals sometimes. So you can insist on a back-up offer to keep your buyers in the game even when there is a previous contract.
Love it! It's never over until....well you know.....Great post
Thank you for the many, many great comments! I really appreciate it!!!
I am surprised at some who felt the listing agtent should've already informed the 1st set of buyers though. She hadn't had the actual executed seller signatures. Not until there are signatures would I ever inform clients that we have a deal.
As for REOs, its true that the verbal committments are stronger, but until the seller signs and returns it's still any buyer's game here in our market. Because financing is fragile, REO sellers have learned to be nicer to what could be the backup offer turned primary buyer. :)
In our market, the vast majority of deals do close, and it comes down simply to the price most of the time. Oddly, I did have a multiple offer recently that I lost to a lower offer, but I was not aware of this until I saw the sale on the MLS. It came down to being a cash offer, in that case.
On the flip side, I had a seller do this same thing, when a cash offer came, with quick close. It was exactly what they wanted, so the higher price offer was rejected, and there was no sweet talking that could have changed that. Would have to either seriously fatten the offer, of make the offer unconditional.
Love it! I haven't yet encountered this scenario, but I will be looking forward to using this strategy when the opportunity arises!
Unfortunately, I had to be the bearer of this bad news just this week, as we received 12 showings and 3 offers in the first 2 days of the listing. If any of the agents would have been aggressive like you describe, and made a case for us to look at their offer, we certainly would have considered it...but none did. In the end it was a conventional with 50% down vs. an FHA loan, so it was no competition.