Hellobee Boards

I have before and it was countered twice with something in between. We didn't get the house tho!

As a buyer I tried not to low ball. The first house we put an offer for was about $15k under asking even though asking was way higher than the house was worth in the neighborhood. We were afraid of insulting them. The house has also been on the market for 6 months. We met at $10k under asking I think, but the deal fell through due to other reasons.

With our current house we offered asking price and asked for $5k help with settlement cost. Our offer was accepted right away. The house was price right and we had no problem offering the asking price.

I don't get the whole 'insulted' by a low offer. I would just counter with something closer to what you were expecting, it's all a game. That said, when we bought our house there were multiple offers going in so we had to go with our best offer on the first go, but we did get the house

That is a lot less.

We offered $25K less then asking on a house, because there was some work that needed to be done. And based on the comps. We ended up not getting the house. I am still bummed about it. Once DH finished his masters we were going to put in another offer, and a week before we were going too, it went under contract. It ended up selling for $1K over our limit and $11K over what we offered.

we low balled..like 100K from asking. but 1. this is a manhattan apt, 2. the apt was a dump and everything needed to be fixed and we wouldn't have been able to afford it at the asking price, 3. this was in 2010 when the economy/housing was still low. they ended up rejecting because they said they had a more qualified buyer (note they didn't say the offer was better). but a few months later, when we were in the middle of writing up the contract for another place, they called back because the other one fell through. my broker negotiated another 30K less. so we got it for 130K less than asking. then did 90K of renovations. my suggestion is that it doesn't hurt to low ball. when we sold our previous place, we were low balled too and we just countered. don't take it personally. everyone wants the best deal they can get.

I have! Our house was in foreclosure, so we offered about 60k less than asking price haha! They countered at about 4k off, so we just worked up from our 60, and down from their 4 and met somewhere in the middle.

We went $7500 under asking plus $5000 in closing costs. But our real estate agent was aware of our budget ($7500 the list price of the house) and that we needed closing costs, and she still showed us the house and then convinced us to put in the bid anyway even though it was the first day the house was listed. We got it, though. It was a flipped house they had paid very little money for so they were in a position to bargain. $40K under is just ridiculous though!

When we were buying our house, I think we initially offered at least $60k lower than the asking price (probably more). That sounds like a lot, but it was only 12% and everyone involved in the sale admitted the buyer intentionally priced high. The seller was probably kind of stunned at first and refused, but we stuck it out and got the house for $48k under! There was nothing wrong with the house (it's beautiful, had tons of custom work and renovations despite being newer) and wasn't on the market very long. The seller was pretty attached to the house and in the end I think he was swayed by the fact that we were capable of maintaining the property the way he did.

That said, when we sold our condo a few years ago we did get some offers we had to reject. One buyer wrongly assumed we were desperate to get out and would take any offer after putting in so much work (floors, sound system, all custom closets, bathroom reno) that none of the other units in the building had. It was risky and when you do it you don't know if you'll get a higher offer! But it was totally worth it...a few weeks into the listing I decided to drop the price slightly and we got better offers. It was kind of funny that everyone suddenly came back wanting in!

We bought our house for almost 39k less than what they were asking. Its what we were comfortable paying, the house was over our limit. We didnt put in an offer until our two realtors talked and ours told theirs it was too much for our budget. The sellers really wanted to sell and said if we put in the offer they would accept it. So we did, and we got it.

Nope, but the housing market is competitive here. I received a low rent offer on our townhouse and I didn't even look at it because I was offended. Most people try and accurately price their house based on the market so going low would be an insult. There are always exceptions though.... some people think there house is above what the market can bear.. I think you need to look at the comps in the area and make an informed decision.

@HLK208: I think buyers have a tendency to assume it's their market so they might as well start out asking for everything! Especially since you just listed it, you don't have to take them seriously. If they really want it they'll come back! And they'll figure out what your level of urgency is.

@HLK208: That is a big chunk. Because you just put the house on the market, I would probably counter with what you mentioned and not go lower, unless you need to sell quickly. There's no reason to rush if you don't like the offer, and it's likely you'll get other offers. Ten days isn't a long time for a house to be listed.

Yup, we low balled on our house by 20%. They were asking for way too much anyway. We ended up meeting in the middle and the appraisal came back about the same.

Yes, and to me it was insulting. At this point I can't remember how much less it was, but I know it was more than $50,000. We wouldn't have been able to pay the mortgage off. I had it priced comparable and even less than some of the comps, this was in 2008 right when the market tanked though.

*Edited
We've low balled but only on bank owned or foreclosures, we never low balled a "real seller". What I hate about this market is the bank prices it way way way under market value, you make a full price offer and they come back asking for $50,000+ what the original list price was. Dh and I are renting until our market isn't saturated with these bank owned homes.

we are just in the process of buying a house and will hopefully close in 2 months (I'm about 3 weeks till my due date)

We found the perfect little dream house to raise our new family in (1888 Victorian house) that seems to be in perfect move-in condition, 3 bedroom 1.5 bath. #1 public school system, walking distance to the center of town, close to the train system for me to get to work. I had my heart pretty set on it, except for the price.

The owners had originally put the house up earlier this year for $100k more than what the asking price is now. They left that high price on the market for only 10 days and then took it down. 7 months later, put it back up on the market for $100k less.

If you look around the neighborhood / town at what houses of this size were selling for, the sellers were WAY overpriced to begin with. So we offered $50k less than the current asking price, because we felt that they were still slightly overpriced in their asking compared to other houses that had the same price with slightly more space.

We only went back and forth twice on negotiations, meeting at a good middle-ground spot that was both fair to us and the sellers (so we agreed on $25k less than the asking price).. it also helped that we were willing to put 50% cash down.. : /

But we'll see.. if inspection goes well (fingers crossed), we will get our perfect little house