Mini Bidding Wars!

I feel the need relay my recent experience. A short sale listing that I have was recently put on the market at a very competitive price and I literally had 5 offers within 2 days- all at or above list price. It actually started a mini bidding war! Many properties listed at the bottom of the respective market have similar results, with “multiple offers received, highest and best offer due on…” in the remarks section on the MLS. All the buyers out there seem to ignore 99% of the listings, but when a great deal comes on the market or lowers the price everyone submits an offer within a couple days.

Take from this what you will, but here’s MY PREDICTION: there are a lot of “investors” (i.e., people who were smart and sold their properties during the bubble of ’04-’05 and have been sitting on $100k waiting for the market to drop) that will buy up all the REOs throughout the year at great deals. Meanwhile the average seller’s home will sit on the market and the media will talk about how bad things still are, but transactions will be up as the foreclosures and short sales filter through the market, even though prices will remain “soft”. All that really means is that banks are willing to take less than the average seller and are pricing them out of the market. However, there are a limited amount of foreclosures and short sales on the market compared to buyers looking for "that one killer deal", and when a good one is listed there's a localized feeding frenzy.

MY ADVICE: if you're serious about buying, be ready to pounce at a moment's notice. That means staying in touch with your Realtor and monitoring the market every day. Also, have all your ducks in line- pre-approval letter, deposit amount available in the bank, purchase offer template created, etc.