Not to be snarky, but I think you might be a bit emotional too. Both parties are trying to make one of the biggest financial transaction of their lives. You don't know what they are going through or what their options are, so there could plenty of reasons for their delay in deciding. Like others said, they may be fine waiting it out to get the price they want. Both of you are acting in your best interests, it's not about speeding this along just to get it over with.
I priced my home by 30k above market, then proceeded to lower it by 5k increments for the next 4 weeks. Not recommended for the faint of heart. It made the buyers think they robbed me only to realize that i sold it for 100k more than what i paid for it at closing.
My advice: Move on to another house. Sellers are entitled to try and sell their house for whatever they want no matter how unreasonable you think that may be and you are entitled to pay whatever you feel is right no matter how unreasonable the sellers think that may be. Youll eventually find a house that you will be willing to pay closer to what the sellers are asking and vice versa.
If you want a response in less than 12 hrs, make your offer expire in 12 hrs. Until you're in the final stages of negotiation, I can see where it would take a day to decide. Your agent should be guiding you in this in what is a reasonable time to keep the offer open given activity in your area. Good luck. Keep us posted. Always stressful buying a house.
Maybe they feel that you're trying to lowball them and so aren't interested in getting into a long haggling process with you. But it doesn't serve them to completely shut the door either, so they're opting for an ambiguous non-response while waiting for a better offer. It's not the politest or the most mature way to handle things, but regardless it's pretty common behavior from my experience.
Well, it's over and done with. They refused to budge after we made our last and final. I probably could have gone higher but not to the price they were sticking with. I'm not sure what their story is as to why they were so inflexible. We moved much further than they did. I don't think they left themselves much wiggle room and I think they're going to have a problem with anyone else in getting what they want. I could be wrong but I guess they, like us, are in no hurry. We're kind of bummed because we really liked it but we have our limits and we're not going to put ourselves in a position to be house poor. We made that mistake on our last house in the beginning and it made things tough. We got out of trouble then and assured ourselves we wouldn't do it again. It also sucks that we're now 0/2 in offers. The first one was different as there were 2 other competing offers. Still, its a bummer. The benefit is that we should see some houses reduce their price more into our range over the next month and the longer this takes, the more we can actually afford. I don't like the feeling that we're wasting money in a rental but at least it's a decent place at a good price in a great location for us.
Ever had a cash buyer ask you the day before closing to "call his banker?" Ain't nothing normal about real estate.
So, we ended up going under contract with this home about 2 weeks ago. Had it inspected last Monday. Inspection found a fairly major water leakage issue with the nice custom shower in the master. There's clearly an issue with the membrane that's allowing water to go through the sides of the shower and outside between the brick and slab. I saw the water myself as I was standing out there while the test was being performed. We presented the report to the sellers. They acted initially as if they would take care of it immediately. Literally every time they take a shower, they're possibly causing more damage. They said they'd get a couple of quotes to get if fixed. A week has gone by and they've only had 1 gc come out and it's not clear if he even gave them a price. We extended the option period by a couple of days but that expires tonight at midnight. The last we heard from their agent was that they'd have it fixed...if we agreed to raise the sales price. Our immediate reaction was "WTF?!" They had shoddy work done and we're expected to pay for 1/2 of it? WTF? So, we've asked for another extension on the option period to consider our options. One option is already off the table...we're not paying more for their f*** up. It's either they get it fixed now at their expense, give us a credit for what we think the work will cost + extra for potential other damage (if it's going through the wall, how bad is the wood damaged?), or we walk. We really don't want to walk because we feel like this is the one...but we can't just take it in the ass because their brother doesn't know how to do proper tile work and install a shower pan correctly. I'm not sure what they're mindset is. They have a house they're building that will be done when we're scheduled to close. If this falls through, our inspection will be available to anyone else who is interested in this house and we won't hesitate to send it out. They're going to have to get it fixed no matter what and there's no guarantee that they'll get more than what they're getting from us. We know they don't have the cash to get into their new house without this one closing. Kind of bummed that this happened but I guess it's good we found it because that could've been a huge unexpected expense in the very near future.
You've gotten way too emotional about this. You're going to walk over repairing a shower? I get that you are a man of principles, but still you might just want to eat this one.
Just stick by your guns. You are clearly not being unreasonable. Wear and tear is expected, and other problems should be noted in the seller disclosure. If they don't know about it, that is what inspections are for. You had your, it uncovered a serious and costly issue and it is what it is. You offered a price for a house that had a shower that didn't leak. The shower leaks. Your resulting price will be less. That is only fair and makes sense. A seller will of course feel bad that they won't get as much money, but it is what it is. Unless you are over the barrel and just have to have the house, I think it is as logical as that. And truth be told, you wouldn't be unreasonable, as a prudent person (forget as the buyer trying to get a fair deal) to lower your offer even further. One shoddy workmanship problem is typically indicative of more. But it all depends on the market. Maybe your price is under market. Maybe they have back-up offers that they don't think will care about the shower issue, who knows. I don't think it has anything to do with principles. Frankly, a lot of people simply aren't in position to deal with these types of issues monetarily. While I don't know the exact dollar amount, it wouldn't surprise me if he is talking about a couple thousand dollars. that may seem like someone is being emotional when fretting over that... but it's not. Surely you wouldn't put a purchase order on say a car, go in and test drive it before finalizing the purchase to only have something not work, and then be expected to pay for the fix??
I had a fight with a seller over concessions for repairs where they were being too stubborn. We eventually told them forget it, we're cancelling. Then they came with a compromise, but we told them it wasn't a negotiating ploy and we really did retract our offer. So then they offered everything we'd asked for to start with. We still said no. Then we found another house we liked better for less. They did eventually sell a couple of months later, but their move to Portland was probably complicated -- they had a closing for the house they were going to buy the day after they were supposed to close the sale with us. Sellers are vulnerable in this process, and probably shouldn't jeopardize a major transaction over small costs.
Idk man, if I were selling I wouldn't foot the whole cost for that repair. You shouldn't reasonably expect to purchase a house that isn't new and move in with no needed repairs or defects. At least you know about it and can have the repair costs rolled into the mortgage. Don't lose out on the house that you really want because of pride and emotions. But if you're adamant, stick to your guns.
This makes no sense. There is a reason there is a recognized process. Which involves (i) a seller disclosure, and (ii) an inspection period. A seller obviously doesn't WANT to foot the whole cost for a repair, but it is what it is. It's a defective product. Which needs to be addressed. A seller can use whatever negotiation tactic they want to, but shouldn't be surprised when a buyer says "oh, that's completely broken and causing damage and we didn't know about it and will cost $x, please have it fixed". That's only logical. If seller wanted an as-is, where-is sale, they should have been clear about that. Of course, that would have scared off potential buyers, because the process isn't that complicated, and it is only fair to allow a buyer to inspect a house and see if they are acquiring what they think they are. Normal wear and tear should be expected. He described something that isn't normal wear and tear. I agree with the general premise that if this is TRULY the "one", be ready to do some compromising, but recognize that for what it is... compromising because of your desire to not pass up on the house...
I get what you're saying, but I just don't see any seller footing the entire bill to repair what OP described. A 50/50 split seems reasonable to me. I could be wrong, but that's my opinion.
Sure, your both talking about "what's market" and negotiating tactics. Which basically means, seller believes that with someone else they won't have to foot the whole bill, or that they've got the buyer locked in. But that is outside of reasonable-ness or fairness. In fairness, the fact of the matter is, it's a defective product. If it's a small dollar amount and implicitly not a "big deal"... well dude might want to compromise. That being said, I've never done a deal where there aren't either enough small $ things that add up or some big items. As noted, it's a huge house. So if it's a small $ amount, and there are no big $ amount items, buyer might want to add up all those small $ amount things that are reasonable, and ask for seller to fix or reduce price by total cost, and be willing to compromise. If it's a big $ amount... it's clearly a big problem, and it is even less reasonable for a buyer to be expected to pay for it. (again absent things like whether or not the rest of the deal is hugely favorable for the buyer, judging both parties' willingness to walk away, etc.) It's broken, it costs a lot of money to fix, I didn't know it was broken, I wouldn't have made the same offer if I knew I'd have to sink another $x into the house, I knew there'd be some wear and tear but not this. here's our reasonable offer. take it or leave it.
Well, if they don't give us an extension on the option period today, we'll see if that's the case. It will hurt because we do like the house, but we are prepared to walk. Wear is one thing. Outright not working is another thing. That thing likely causing further damage every time they take a shower is even more of another thing. I'm not sure why I should be the one to foot even a part of the bill. This isn't wear and tear. This is work they had done this year and any reasonable person would expect that the price of the house includes a working and not leaking shower.
50/50 is fair for most repairs, but I'd want them to pay 100% of this. I don't recommend letting them get it fixed. They either did the shower themselves, or hired the wrong guys to begin with. Bad shower installs are very common. See if you can get a couple of estimates, and require a repair allowance or sales price reduction. You could also run into a problem with your lender with these repairs.
That's why we're trying to get an extension of the option period...to get some quotes on our own. I have a feeling they're going to balk. We have 9 hours and 27 minutes left on the current extension. I wouldn't be against a credit towards the sales price.
