in the area. Lots are coming back here, where they may not have lived in a while. We have a large and vibrant retired military community...
NEGOTIATING CAN BE HARDER ON YOUR OWN
I help keep the transaction “at arm’s length,” such that personalities and emotions do not become involved. Price negotiations take a special skill and understanding of the structure and psychology of offering and counter-offering. I keep the transaction dispassionate and rational. For example, you as a buyer might like a specific home but despise its wood- paneled walls, shag carpet, and lurid orange kitchen. When you work with an agent, you can express your opinions on the current owner’s decorating skills and complain about how much it will cost to upgrade the home without insulting the owner. I will translate that to the seller — that you very much like the property but can see having to spend a certain amount in decorating costs, and thus can offer that much less.
CONTRACTUALLY SPEAKING…
There are many contracts and documents involved in purchasing a house. The stack is more than an inch thick. Unless you’re a real estate lawyer or title agent, these documents will be foreign to you. Yet, they require detailed and accurate completions. Buying a property is not necessarily a “fill-in-the- blanks” transaction. One mistake, let’s say in title work, could haunt the buyer well down the line after purchase. This very situation happened. A property that sat on a double lot was put on the market. The neighbor bought it to carve off a bit of the second lot to expand his yard. The seller then put the home back on the market, and it sold. Months later, through a property tax notification, it came out that, in preparing new deeds for the properties, the expanded yard area was correctly in the name of the neighbor; however,
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