I don’t want to burst anyone’s bubble, however…
Today I’m going to talk about those “I want to buy your home” letters. So if you’ve gotten one, or two, or 10, or 100 letters at your home, or maybe at your home, but about a rental property that you own, and they say “we want to buy your property.”
I’ve had a lot of clients say “My home is so popular, everyone wants to buy it!” So, I don’t want to burst anyone’s bubble, but thousands and thousands of people are getting these letters, so it’s not just your home or property.
The next thing is, these people know nothing about your home. It’s basically an address, and they’re just mailing letters to addresses. They have no idea how wonderful, or not wonderful, your home is, and you know how a lot of those letters, they have a photo of a cute couple, maybe somebody with their dog, or just the most darling baby? Well, I’m not going to say those are phony, because they’re probably not phony, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s a cute couple that’s looking for their first home for themselves and their puppy.
The truth is, a lot of these people are agents, in fact, I’ve gotten such letters, and I’ve just gotten a hunch the way they’re written, that made me think “I bet this is an agent” and sure enough, I look them up on one of two websites, and I find out yes, this person is a real estate agent.
They’re not disclosing it, as they should, and frankly, a lot of those agents are either looking for a bargain, or they’re looking for business, and just pretending that they want to buy.
Either one is kind of shady if they don’t say that they’re an agent. The folks that are not agents (actually this even applies to some of the agents) but mainly the investors are looking for a sucker, sorry to say that, or someone who’s desperate.
So basically, someone who has not kept up with their home value, that doesn’t make you a sucker, but in their minds, that’s kind of what they’re looking for. Or someone’s that’s like, “I need to sell right now!”
The reason is that they typically want to pay you way under market value. We’re not talking 5% under market value, or 10% under market value. They’re looking for 12%, 15%, 18%, 20%, really as low as you’ll go, nowhere near the value of your home.
Think about it, these people, their business model is not to buy homes at market value. Why in the world would they send letters? They can buy a home at market value just by working with an agent. It doesn’t cost them anything as a buyer. Their business model is built on buying bargains.
Here’s a quick story for you, Vue De Ville Court, this is a street in Pacific Beach. I had a client there, we talked for years and years about selling his rental house, and then he called me and said, “I want to sell it, but you know what? I got a letter from a guy, and he’s willing to pay me what it’s worth,” at that time it was like $925,000. I said, “So he’s going to pay you 925K?” He’s like, “Yup!” and I said, “Okay, well, I’m very happy for you, I’m not convinced it’s going to happen,” and he’s like, “Oh, it’s going to happen!” and guess what?
The guy stopped returning his calls, because he realized either that he was overpaying, or sometimes the strategy that they use is to offer a low number and then for some reason they’ll say, “Oh, you know, I looked at the comps, I looked at the numbers, I did my calculations, I can’t pay that, can’t pay 925K, but I can pay 825K or 800K.” The point is, these people are not looking to pay you market value.
If you have any questions, call / text 858-457-KENT (5368) or email gary@garykent.com. Thanks for reading and watching this video!
