Investors seem to be taking a shotgun approach to finding steals… fax off several lowball offers on various properties all at once. It’s the latest way to find sellers willing to “give away” their properties.
I have no problem with investors making offers, and there are some sellers who are happy to take them. But don’t waste my time so you don’t waste yours!
I’m talking about the way these offers are made. Top investor offer problems that bug me and my sellers:
- Fax after hours on a Friday to the office fax, and don’t call the agent to check on the fax for days. You think we have an assistant at the office 24/7 monitoring the fax machine? I much prefer when agents call first, so I can give them my home fax number.
- Make no deposit. It’s “upon acceptance”. Great, so we can accept the offer and you back out with no skin in the game? That’s not how we do things for “normal” buyers so what makes the investor special?
- Leave out all the addenda. Lack of a Lead Paint Rider is a problem for me… I can’t allow my seller to accept anything until I have it and the buyer’s acknowledgment of seller disclosures.
- Provide a contact number that gets me to a voice mailbox that’s full. Yup, you faxed off 20 offers and left town for the weekend…
- Don’t go in the property, save that for the AS-IS inspection period… when the investor will suddenly realize the kitchen needs another $10k of work. I don’t like to take my listings off the market for this.
- Leave half the contract blank, and use one that’s several years out of date. Technical problems mean my seller can’t accept it. “Owner of record” and no legal description? Please fill in all the blanks!
- Make it assignable. So you don’t really want to buy it, you want to flip it to someone while we wait or back out if you can’t? Please find that person first, and have them submit the offer to us!
- Corporate buyers and scribbled signatures. So we don’t know who the authorized company representative is? Please type the president’s name below the line.
- Forgetting to date the contract. OK, now it looks like the agent got a blank, signed contract from an investor last month, and is filling in the blanks afterwards…
- And the worst? Adding a batch of onerous clauses in an addendum. Like “buyer chooses title company, seller pays for it, and if the deal doesn’t close, seller pays the costs anyway.” That’s just one… I’ve seen others. I’m glad you have a cranky attorney but my seller won’t accept that. Use the standard contract please.
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