Either one of them would have been willing to pay the fair market value of $100,000 for the property. Money was no problem; both buyers had the ability to pay in cash. They both approached the bank but unfortunately, the bank refused to take any offers on the property until the actual seller had listed the property for sale on the open market. For some reason, possibly due to an oversight or an inexperienced agent, the sellers put the property on the market for only $67,000. The property was easily underpriced by $33,000. Second, their hired agent didn’t market it properly and there were errors made in the MLS listing. As a result, it did not show up in search results for other agents who had buyers looking for that type of property. The address was also incorrect. As a result, the listing did not show up on any of the real estate websites that use a map display. Finally, the agent neglected to put a sign on the property. The person who eventually bought it lived down the road and drove past the property every day. They had done research noticing that the property was in default and they hoped to get it cheap in a foreclosure sale. After the bank refused to work with the initial buyers, each waited for the listing to appear. When it didn’t show up in searches, they gave up. Ultimately, both buyers moved on to find other pieces of land. Meanwhile, the property sat on the market, unnoticed. Because of the agent’s errors, no interest was generated, and the property ultimately went into foreclosure. As mentioned above, the buyer who lived nearby knew the bank had been trying to foreclose on the property. He diligently followed up on his research of the property and found out the bank had successfully foreclosed on it and he ended up buying it well below market.
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