Multiple Offers Situation - Buyers Beware of This

Multiple Offers Situation - Buyers Beware of This

Every desirable property listed  at the market price is getting multiple offers. If you are a buyer and facing this multiple offer situation, be aware about these few things.

Number one thing, never take off the inspection contingency. It doesn't matter how good the house looks. You never know, especially in South Florida, we have a termite problem here. We can have some hidden problems, maybe the plumbing problems. Some of the homes have polybutylene pipes for the plumbing depending on which year it was built. Then we also have here some houses that were built in 2006-2007, they have the Chinese drywall situation. You can cut it down to maybe 5 days to make the offer more, stronger, sweeter. But do not take off that contingency,  inspection contingency.

Number two, I heard, but I never had the situation with another real estate agent, but I heard that some of the sellers and their agents are asking the buyer, putting a deposit is given to the seller and or that particular portion of the deposit will be non-refundable  no matter of what. Say $5,000 you pay extra, that's non-refundable. Those are a no-no because your deposit has to go to a Title Company or to a Title Attorney's account who has an escrow account, so it is safe to a third party.

So these are very important things. Now, a couple of situations also goes  you may have to pay a little bit more money on top of the appraisal if the appraisal value comes low. Those are the competitions you are in right now. And as long as that's not too much of a high price, you are okay because the properties are in appreciation. And if you and your family loves a home and say, for example, 20 grand over the appraised value, property values are going up. And also if you're getting a mortgage, that's a very small amount every month, it's not going to hurt you because you're going to enjoy the home throughout the time you are going to live in that particular property. So, that is fine to some extent. 

Yesterday I saw one property in West Pembroke Pines, came in the market one day, and when we called them, they say, oh, it's under contract, that's impossible. A property coming to the market, it cannot be under contract and it can have offers but cannot be multiple contracts. I don't know about this particular situation, but some of the agents to make both sides of the commission, they are doing this. They are pre marketing the property. There is nothing wrong to pre-market the property, but it is wrong. If you don't give enough chance and you are hurting your seller also because the multiple offers make sellers more money and also give all the buyers a fair chance to get that property.

So sometimes if you see this kind of unethical behavior, you can always report to the real estate board. There is a Miami board and the Fort Lauderdale board, but for yourself, you beware about these situations. Do not give any deposit any money separately and do not take off the inspection contingency.

Hopefully, this video and this information will help you to make a decision when you make the next offer and give me a call. My name is Shawn Bhakta from RE/MAX Presidential.  My number is right here. I've been serving South Florida for over 21 years. I can definitely help you.