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- 2 Big 2 Fail
- Contributions:0
Most buyers today won't buy unless they feel that they are stealing the house. It does not matter if it is a McMansion or a dump.
I know a guy who used to make out with the outside of his house
- Mark75NYC
- Contributions:1316
When prices are sane, and stable, buyers had the luxury of letting focusing more on whether a particular house was "the one" for them.
Now, with glut of drastically overpriced homes sitting on the market (a residue of the biggest housing bubble this generation will ever witness) unsold month after month, prices falling -- plunging in some areas, slowly sinking in others -- price is, and should be first and foremost in buyers' minds. This is no time to allow yourself to fall in love with any house, unless you are positive that the numbers are solid.
- 2 Big 2 Fail
- Contributions:0
I guess that brings a new definition to "loving" a house Tom. LOL
well, in the good old days, all the homes in an area were comparably priced. Sure a nicer one, or a better location got a bit more but you could sort of account for that. The range was narrow.
NOW, I look at a zip, and see foreclosure homes 2000 sq ft, $300k to $350k, regular sellers $400 - $550K.
So, for 150 to 200k, you have to ask what is love worth? I can buy a lot of love for that!
- wetdawgs
- Contributions:26804
With the glut of houses on the market, perhaps loving the house can happen at the same time as negotiating for the best deal. If 1 in 20 houses in my price range are ones we could enjoy living in, why do we have to take the first of those if the price is not competitive with the current market conditions?
- pinksandbaby
- Contributions:8551
ew rob.
The people who bought our house loved it. LOved it. I haven't figured out why yet... lol! They really did though! She would not lose it.
The house we bought I really like. Location, land and floorplan are great. Once we get the interior the way we want, the angels will sing LOL
- 2 Big 2 Fail
- Contributions:0
Even in this market, lowball offers will rarely work. For the months of May and June, less than 3% of all sales in northern NJ were lowball sales. If your so confident that prices are going to crash and the $500,000 house you like will one day be $300,00, then wait for the asking price to hit $300,000 and then buy. You can't buy a house today for tomorrow's prices.
And in my area, there is rarely a wide gap between comparable houses. We are not a foreclosure driven market so regular sellers are in control, not bank owned REOs.
- 80smusicrox
- Contributions:420
I'm so glad we didn't fall for the two houses we fell in love with...maybe it was three. We would have overpaid and been kicking ourselves now. They were/are overpriced...and I guess we knew that plus the fact that they were on the market awhile. We thought it'd be better to wait and see if they'd drop their askings to match the drops of sold comps. One was priced fairly well and sold. The other one went off the market. And the last still stubbornly holds on while prices are falling all around it.
I think it goot down to we needed to wait and watch...eventually, we'd find something. And if we wasn't love at first sight, but had potential for love to bloom at a price we felt good about...that would be the "one".
For me it was always good to like the house and perhaps even love it, but also to keep in mind the location, lot, and other factors that would make the house attractive to someone other than me should I need to sell the house one day. I am not fooled into thinking I will ever stay in a home for 30 years, I mean after all did you marry your spouse just because of love: you like their looks, humor, and other things besides just the love factor, the same goes for a house.
- 2 Big 2 Fail
- Contributions:0
I thought you bought a house 80s.
- 80smusicrox
- Contributions:420
I did, well, close anyway...real close. Right now, this house wasn't the "the one"...but we plan to make it it work. I plan on making it "the one".
''it would have great bones'
ok you must be a realtor because they are the only ones I heard use that term. Anyway, it may not be looked at as the biggest investment buy it most def is the biggest transaction one would make so HELL YES we pay attention to the #s.
- 2 Big 2 Fail
- Contributions:0
"Great bones" is a stupid con game, just like "old world charm" and "cozy."
- 80smusicrox
- Contributions:420
3girls...yep. the house we're buying is not very handsome on the outside. But I can clean him up and he'll be a new man. And he's a cheap date.
- scecy
- Contributions:108
SoCal -- no, I'm not a realtor. I just watch way too many HGTV shows. I do apologize for letting that language slip in. :-)
And of course everyone should pay attention to the numbers. I just think buyers are forced to be much more analytical now.
- 2 Big 2 Fail
- Contributions:0
Any house is good, even crack houses, as long as you paint the walls a neutral color and you install granite counters.
ok, sorry, too much HGTV.
- 80smusicrox
- Contributions:420
Paint the walls neutral and granite counters...that's from "Flip This/That House".
No amount of flipping will deny the horrible traffic on the street or the crackhouse next door.
It's true...about falling in love with the house. Don't just fall for the looks. Consider the whole package. Location, location, location. Anyone can flip a house...but you can't flip it's location.
- Trolling.
- Contributions:1290
" But daddy, how did you know about the bust of 06 before the $hit hit the fan?"
Well son, lot's of common folk and doomers agreed on one common thing, homes were over priced. Then in the late summer of 07 the bottom fell out and all hell broke loose, only a few made it out. I remember this one guy, could have been a girl, never the less, had the impression that he could flip (MAKE EASY MONEY) a house with two kitchens, leaky roofs.
'
- Marla Vail, "Marla Vail"
- Contributions:1
As an agent in Southern Maryland our market is one of the "worst" in the country for drop in sales. For that reason I have been focusing on working with buyers, simply because most sellers don't want to drop their prices to give them away.
15 of my last 17 sales transactions have been working with the buyers.
To answer your question....YES....absolutely buyers do still fall in love with homes, and must do so in order to make a purchase in this market.
That said, if a home is overpriced for the market, it doesn't really matter how much the buyer loves the house. Two elements come into play:
#1 the home must be priced in line with the market.
#2 the home has to be worthy of the buyer "loving" it enough to want to write an offer.
#2 is a variable. Being worthy of being loved could mean the house is in poor condition, but it may also be at a price that makes the buyers "love" it enough to want to buy it. It's like the ugly step child. It may not look all that good, but it may have other elements that can make it endearing to the buyer.
If the home is absolutely gorgeous....but is overpriced, it simply will not sell.
Honestly, it is no joking matter. If a home is priced too high based on the current market, no buyer will love it enough to write an offer. There is too much inventory and not enough demand. I'd suggest contacting an experienced REALTOR rather than attempting to determine value on your own. Even great sites like Zillow tend to (at least in my area) attach too high a value on homes to be able to sell. My home, according to Zillow, is "worth" $315,000, however, as an agent I know I'd be very lucky to get $300,000 for my residence.
I hope this helped.
Marla Vail, Certified Residential Specialist
- wrstandi
- Contributions:64
Funny, I think it's because almost every house built after 1990 looks exactly like the houses on either side of it. How can you fall in love with something so easily replaced?
- Webster3
- Contributions:798
I hated the house we are in when we pulled up. Almost didn't go in. ooogly! (It is a 60's home and I like old homes with lots of woodwork) Then when we walked around to see the view in the back I said "it's got potential" and 9 years later we're still remodeling and making more pleasing but absolutely LOVE it!!!!!
What's really weird is from day one I felt comfortable in it probably because it was similar to the house I grew up in.
- 80smusicrox
- Contributions:420
The house we're buying has a serious oogly factor too...but the inside is very nice and has many extras, square footage is just what we wanted, property and neighborhood are very desireable. When it first went on the market in May '06 at $565k, the ugliness at that price was nowhere worth it. But over two yrs later at $285k, I don't mind it and feel we can work some wonders on it.
- caliguy
- Contributions:1283
It's also less practical to fall in love with a house when almost 70% of the ones the majority of ppl can afford here and are buying are either short sales or foreclosures.
Most of the time the short sale can't go through so no use getting too excited if you're going to be disappointed, and it's pretty hard to fall in love with an REO and see past the dead grass or stank carpet. Sad but true these days.
- space_acer
- Contributions:4311
'cause I found an evil monkey in my closet....
- Randy_H
- Contributions:4385
"Falling in love" with a house is just code for giving up or revealing your negotiating position. This is one of my pet peeves. If a buyers agent is truly interested in performing a fiduciary responsibility to thier clients then s/he would advise against "falling in love" with any particular house.
In the event the clients fall for a house anyway -- ie. that guy's wife in the Suzanne Researched This commercials -- then the buyer's agent has an obligation to do everything possible to conceal that fact from the seller's side. My observation is that all too often the buyer's agent is willing to share any and everything about the buyer with the sellers. That has worked for and against me in the past. Our last sale was held up by a lowball buyer who only came up after our agent got their agent to cough up personal info which should not have been shared that revealed the buyer "really needed to buy" our house, despite his stoic negotiating face. And he was a good negotiator, who would have done much better without either his or our agents involved. (In fact, we ended up negotiating directly with one another around our middle-school maturity agents, just to get the deal done).
The first rule of negotiating is never reveal your reserve point or your walk away point. You want the counterparty to think you're closer to walking away then you really are. "Falling in love with" a house, and letting anyone know that fact, only ensures you're going to pay dearly for that love.
- Randy_H
- Contributions:4385
Excuse spelling & typos. Trying to use Safari Mac atm. Buggy in Zillow.
- pcmodem
- Contributions:116
Its hard for me to "fall in love" with a property thats going to take a significantly larger portion of my earnings to live in than the place I last "fell in love" with, my rented apartment. Believe you me, the day houses I can fall in love with get affordable, i'll be falling in love immediatly.
- space_acer
- Contributions:4311
only ensures you're going to pay dearly for that love.
Or get a painful peniciline shot!!!!
- kelargo
- Contributions:794
define "love"
Do buyers ever fall in love with a house anymore?
In the good old days, people who wanted to buy a house would look at houses until they found the "one." They would know it when they walked in the door--it would have great bones and they could envision how they would fix it up, or it was the perfect location and size, or it had the charm they were looking for, etc. They didn't want to spend too much money on it, but neither did they want to "lose" the house so negotiating on price became a true back and forth compromise. Yeah, I know. Those days are gone. It seems to me that buyers now are all about the numbers. They find a house that they could like, if the price is right; calculate a price based on what the house sold for last time; lowball and walk away if the sellers don't agree. No problem. Seems so detached to me. What happened to falling in love with a house? I never thought of my house as my biggest investment and I sure don't think of it as an investment now. But what happened to buying a house to live in and enjoy? I really liked my present house when I first walked into it. I guess I always assumed that out there there would be someone who would like it just as much, someone who could get excited about it. Now, I think that such a buyer might not exist. It will be all about the numbers, so buyers will remain emotionally detached. Right? [And before you jump on me telling me that it is a bad time to buy in the first place, I will say that I agree. I realize that it is scary to buy right now.] This is just a commentary on how the whole buying/selling process has changed.
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