Over the past year, on several of my listings I’ve had offers from agents with one particular out-of-town brokerage. They are scouting out ‘deals’ for their client. They never come out to the property before writing their offers, which is a big red flag. In fact, they haven’t called me once prior to submitting their offers, which is also a red flag. These are literally blind offers. The offers are all cash and quick closes, with only a ‘verification walk through’ after the offer is accepted. That’s another red flag, which has me speculating that they will either (a) try to renegotiate after seeing the properties, or (b) cancel the deals. With those three red flags flying high on every offer, my clients have yet to accept anything from these buyers and their agents, or even counter one of their offers.
Part of the reason my sellers aren’t accepting offers from them or engaging with them is that I am highly skeptical of these circumstances. If we had no other comparable offers to choose from, I might be inclined to have my sellers accept one of these offers at some point. The fact is they are always lower than everybody else. I’ve seen them come in at the asking price, and I’ve seen them come in lower, but I’ve never seen them overbid. Since they’ve only made offers on homes where I get multiple offers there’s been no reason to engage them.
I am certain that they occasionally get offers accepted, otherwise they wouldn’t be doing it. How often do they close deals? That’s another question, and I can’t believe in Marin there are a lot of agents and their clients accepting what they offer. In the end, if the deal does close, it makes me wonder if it was too good to be true. One day I may just find out, but only as a last resort.
There is another, possibly related angle I’ve seen worked. Every once in a while, I look at offers from buyers who want the option to assign the contract to a third party. There can be a legitimate reason for this, such as a husband, wife, sibling or child becoming the assignee. The red flag goes up again when it’s someone who is looking for an investor as an assignee. I’ve seen that before, but I’ve never accepted such an offer. I suppose the assigner gets some kind of commission or cut from the assignee. Why doesn’t the assignee just write the contract for himself or herself? Why the middle man? It just seems like a long shot for my sellers, and not something I’d advise anyone to get into unless there was an the absence of all other options.
Sellers and buyers are protected and bound by the real estate purchase agreement. If a buyer acts outside the boundaries of the purchase agreement, sellers can always give the buyers a 48-hour notice to perform. It’s the put up or shut up piece of paper and I rarely use it. However, if a buyer doesn’t continue to abide by the contract within that 48 window, the sellers can cancel the deal.
What a seller and their agent really want is a no-nonsense deal from a potential buyer. We don’t play games, but we do know how to spot them.