Rebound

Real estate really is a game.  It's a game where the rules are constantly changing, and no two rounds are the same.  I've spent well over a year reading up on every aspect of the process, both nationally and locally, and still was regularly surprised by what happened during my own search.

Case in point: about a week after I turned down (or was rejected by) the Mateo Avenue condo, I got a call back from Regina.  The sellers were wondering if I would be interested in seller financing.  I was fairly familiar with this idea based on my research; the basic idea is that, since I had offered $X and they wanted $X+30k, they would lend me the $30k in a separate loan.  There can be some advantages to seller financing - you can get a better rate than from a bigger lender, and you can more easily get approved.  I figured that the sellers probably realized that I was the only serious buyer they had encountered, and that they thought I wouldn't go above $X because it was the most I could afford.  In reality, I could afford more than their asking price, I just didn't think it was worth that much.  I wasn't interested in taking out a $30k loan for an overpriced home.

I told Regina that I wasn't interested in financing, but, if they were willing to drop their price, I'd still be interested in the property.  We went through some back-and-forth, and they ended up coming down $20k.  That was still $10k over my initial offer.  I mulled it over for a while - it was more than I thought it was worth, but it seemed like this might be my last and only chance to get a decent condo that I could afford in the area I wanted.  In the end, I decided that I'd go for it.

Rather than put together a new offer, we got back a counter from the sellers with the agreed-upon price.  It also came with an "as-is" addendum.  I talked with Regina for a while about what this meant - basically, it said that the sellers wouldn't be making any repairs for stuff that had already been disclosed or for "minor" problems found during the inspection.  It's intended to acknowledge that this is an older property and that stuff won't be perfect, and that I'm buying it with that understanding.  I wanted to make sure that I wouldn't be giving up any rights to ask for repairs or credits for major issues found during inspection.  I was safe on this front, so I signed the counter and the addendum, and we entered contract.