A Real Estate Company Policy Prevented seller to
counter-offer
I represent the buyers. I sent an offer
via email to the seller’s agent. Buyers requested to get
responses back from sellers by next day 6:00 PM.
6:00 PM arrived and past, but no
responses received from seller. I text and sent email to
find out the status of our offer. Finally, after few times
tries, I got a response back requesting buyers to submit a
new offer with a better price. Sellers did not
counter-offer. I conveyed the information to my clients
(Buyers), they were un-happy, they wanted to see the actual
counter-offer terms and conditions and not to submit another
offer with a better price.
I have seen in the case of multiple
offers where the seller notifies all interested buyers that
there is a multiple-offer situation and invites all
prospective buyers to give their best offers, and after a
deadline, the seller reviews all offers and decides who gets
the deal. But, in our case there was no multi-offer and
simply seller/seller’s agent wanted us to play high/high
game with no guarantee they accept our offer at all.
I responded, with my buyers
suggestions, indicating buyers would like to see the
counter-offer from seller and go from there. We gave them
another half-day to receive seller’s response. As usual, I
followed up with a text and phone calls. Again, the time
came and past and no responses received, I text twice and
re-send email again, no respond. I called after a couple of
times, the agent (wife) finally answered and she claimed
they (her and her husband) did not see my email. I re-sent
the email and stated that my buyers want to see the seller’s
counter-offer.
The seller’s agent said, our company
policy is that when seller doesn’t agree with the offer,
we request a new offer to be sent with a better price. Wa!
That was surprising, since this is a seller decision and not
the real estate company policy. My buyers didn’t like that
attitude and that real estate’s policy and asked me to drop
the offer. I am not sure if the Sellers know what their
agent doing to their business! Both Buyers and sellers lost
the deal because of this real estate company policy!
As I stated earlier, I understand
inviting buyers for their best offer in the case of
multiple-offers, but I don’t know why the real estate
company policy preventing sellers to counter-offer in a
single offer situation. The only reason that I can think of,
is the seller is not serious to sell and wants to see how
far the buyers go without committing themselves to sell.
But, how it ends up to become a real estate company policy,
is a puzzle for me.
Many buyers, such as my clients, don’t
appreciate these types of behaviors and drop their offers.
If any of you can come up with good reasons that a real
estate company should always prevent sellers to make
counter-offer while not running the buyers off, please let
me know. |
