After 33 days on the market — and a couple near-offers — we got The Second Chance House under contract today. I’m a little surprised it took so long, but given this real estate market, I shouldn’t be. The house is beautiful, and based on all the great feedback we’ve gotten these past several weeks, we knew we’d get it under contract pretty quickly.
The funny thing about this one is that it was the same agents who almost got us the original offer — from the woman who backed out after finding out her son got his girlfriend pregnant. The agents loved the house, and have been telling us for weeks that they’d find a buyer for us…and they did.
The original offer was about a thousand dollars below what we considered to be our minimum acceptable, so we negotiated up a couple thousand dollars and came to an agreement that makes both sides very happy. We got a couple thousand above our minimum, but are paying a couple thousand extra in closing costs, so from our perspective, it’s about the lowest we’d accept…but that’s good enough for us.
My biggest concern at this point is the appraisal. It’s an FHA loan, so the appraiser may be tough on us. That, coupled with the fact that there are a *lot* of foreclosures in this neighborhood, and we may run into appraisal problems. But, we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it…
The buyers have 15 days due diligence (ending on Friday, February 20), and we’re scheduled to close on Monday, February 23. So, we may not have to make another mortgage payment on this one…even better!
Congrats on house. Hope it closes for you. If its FHA, I’d be surprised if its not at least 2 weeks late on closing though. Either way, one more great house to start building a solid reputation.
I honestly believe if you keep churning out homes this nice, RE agents will head your way first.
Bilge –
Compliments like that are what keep us motivated!
Thanks!