Looking at houses ~ NOW LAND!!! COUNTER OFFER ACCEPTED!!!

[mrbstephens]

OK. Back to the Victorian house. A friend of ours knows about rebuilding old houses and wants to look at the house with my DH and has offered to help with the work. DH respects his opinion and has agreed to look at it again! Plus, we're looking into putting up one of those metal shops instead of trying to make the barn into a shop. I was starting to give up on it, but now I'm getting excited again!

 

[mrbstephens]

We heard you can get a metal shop for $7,000, but I would imagine the concrete slab, electric and heating would be an additional cost. Anyone know if that's right?

 

[mrbstephens]

Anyone have any experience with a short sale? The real estate agent explained that we would make an offer and then the bank would (or would not) make a counter offer. At this point we could either take it or leave it. There would be no more negotiating. The asking price is $399,000 on the Victorian house and I was wondering on how low of an offer we could get away with. :/

 

[Crusty McPottydoodle]

I admit I have not much understanding of short sales (I don't know that we have those here in Canada), but here is my 2 cents.

Is there any way to find out how much mortgage is that the bank holds?

Do you know what the assessed value is?

Do you have a sense of what the maximum your budget would allow to pay for the house and still have financial room to do the necessary work on it?

Has it been on the market long?

Not knowing the answer to either of these questions, my gut reaction would be to offer half (or maybe even less) and see what the bank comes back with.

If you have the answers to those questions, perhaps you might have an idea of what kind of money the bank MUST get out of the deal and how desperate they are to sell and that might help you figure out what to offer (I would offer a good chunk less than the bank MUST get, so that they may counter with something close to what works for you).

 

[mrbstephens]

I admit I have not much understanding of short sales (I don't know that we have those here in Canada), but here is my 2 cents.

Is there any way to find out how much mortgage is that the bank holds?

Do you know what the assessed value is?

Do you have a sense of what the maximum your budget would allow to pay for the house and still have financial room to do the necessary work on it?

Has it been on the market long?

Not knowing the answer to either of these questions, my gut reaction would be to offer half (or maybe even less) and see what the bank comes back with.

If you have the answers to those questions, perhaps you might have an idea of what kind of money the bank MUST get out of the deal and how desperate they are to sell and that might help you figure out what to offer (I would offer a good chunk less than the bank MUST get, so that they may counter with something close to what works for you).

I just sent an email to my realtor asking what the owners still owe on the house and what the assessed value is. According to public records they bought the house in 2004 for $498,000. They put it up for sale in 2007 for $665,000, then in 2008 for $675,000, then in 2009 for $575,000 and now in 2010 for $399,000. I know it was a short sale 2 years ago, there was an offer made and the deal fell through.

 

[hwillm1977]

Anyone have any experience with a short sale? The real estate agent explained that we would make an offer and then the bank would (or would not) make a counter offer. At this point we could either take it or leave it. There would be no more negotiating. The asking price is $399,000 on the Victorian house and I was wondering on how low of an offer we could get away with. :/

This wasn't a short sale, but when I was a child the bank re-possessed our home (I guess the Canadian equivalent of a short sale), and sold it.

We owed $65,000 on the mortgage, they sold it for $17,000... but it was a large, old house in the middle of nowhere so I'm sure the bank was just happy to get rid of it.

Keeping our fingers crossed that you get the Victorian, I LOVE that house...

 

[mrbstephens]

Anyone have any experience with a short sale? The real estate agent explained that we would make an offer and then the bank would (or would not) make a counter offer. At this point we could either take it or leave it. There would be no more negotiating. The asking price is $399,000 on the Victorian house and I was wondering on how low of an offer we could get away with. :/

This wasn't a short sale, but when I was a child the bank re-possessed our home (I guess the Canadian equivalent of a short sale), and sold it.

We owed $65,000 on the mortgage, they sold it for $17,000... but it was a large, old house in the middle of nowhere so I'm sure the bank was just happy to get rid of it.

Keeping our fingers crossed that you get the Victorian, I LOVE that house...

What you're talking about is a foreclosure. A short sale gives the owners an opportunity to sell the house at less than what they owe on their mortgage without it negatively affecting their credit. The bank will wind up getting a lot less than what is owed on the loan and the sellers sometimes still owe on the loan, but not nearly as much.

My real estate agent doesn't seem to understand the rules with a short sale and she's not giving me answers so I'll be calling the listing agent. I'm trying to make sure that the bank actually gave them the go ahead to sell as a short sale. Sometimes people put their houses up as a short sale without going through the paper work and this is most commonly why the deal falls through.

 

[rebecca100]

Wow are we on different levels!! I am looking for a place too, but instead of $399,000 we have to take zeros off to around $39,000 and need that financed! We have even considered places that were literally falling down with trees in the roofs to be fixed up.

 

[mrbstephens]

Wow are we on different levels!! I am looking for a place too, but instead of $399,000 we have to take zeros off to around $39,000 and need that financed! We have even considered places that were literally falling down with trees in the roofs to be fixed up.

Well, this is the Hamptons........

 

[hwillm1977]

Wow are we on different levels!! I am looking for a place too, but instead of $399,000 we have to take zeros off to around $39,000 and need that financed! We have even considered places that were literally falling down with trees in the roofs to be fixed up.

lol... yep... we paid $25,000 for our fixer-upper, and I lived here without electricity or running water for a few weeks before we could get wiring and a pump into the house. Our neighbour did the same thing though, and fixed hers... now she's selling for $120,000... I'm hoping we can do the same to move up to a real farm.

I'm pretty sure we don't have short sales in Canada... I've only ever heard of it watching American TV