This Blog Post by Todd Clark, a wise broker from Beaverton, Oregon, is worth sharing to folks in our N. C. Triad Region. It's great advice and I couldn't have said it any better.
Getting divorced is bad (and sad) enough, without having to lose money on the investment that both husband and wife worked hard to achieve. Make a good sale, split the funds, and begin your life again with cash on hand!
Thanks to Todd for some great advice!
By Todd Clark (Broker/Sales Coach) 503-524-9494
Last month I closed on a house, but there was something about the sale of this house I didn’t advertise because I didn’t want it to affect the sale. What was the issue? The sellers were in a nasty divorce and one thing is when buyers see divorce and they see a house for sale, they know that this could be the final step in the divorce and they low-ball offers hoping that the sellers just want to get the sale over with, so they can move on with their lives. (For the most part the buyers are right)
But, what do you say when a buyer’s agent calls you about the house and then asks, about the divorce? What? What divorce? This is where I had to play dumb! The buyer’s agent said “Clearly this is divorce and a nasty one, is this going to affect the close if we put an offer in?” I then asked, how do you know it is a divorce?
The buyer’s agent started to laugh and asked “When was the last time you were over at the house?” I said “Last Monday, why?” You may want to go over there, then you won’t have to ask me how I knew” So, I immediately got in my car and drove over, I had to find out what this agent was talking about. There it was in the driveway behind the house, a pile of woman’s clothes, jewelry, pictures and anything to do with the soon to be ex-wife.
I immediately called the husband who was still living in the house and asked what was up with the 5 foot pile of stuff in the backyard. He said “OH, she said she wanted her stuff back, so I told her she needed to come get it…Now! I thought it would help de-clutter the house.” I said “Yeah, but if someone sees that and puts an offer in, they know you are desperate to sell just to get the divorce over with, the offer we get today could be $15,000 less than you are asking, just because they know that you hate each other and want the divorce over with, that is why none of my advertising says this is a divorce.”
Sure, enough, while I was over there, we got 3 offers all $20,000 less than asking and all from the showings that weekend. I told him “Look, these offers wouldn’t have been this low had you just kept your emotions in check, but now we are in a tough situation, do we accept and move on or do we hope that after cleaning up this mess that we get a full price offer.”The husband decided to spend $29.95 and get a moving truck to put the stuff in and then two days later we got a full price offer, the house was nice, but it wasn’t worth $20,000 less because people saw what they saw as an opportunity.
What do you do about the Ex-Factor?
Doug Patterson ABR®
Park Place Real Estate, Broker-In-Charge
SFR HUD Certified Broker
Playing dumb is the best option unless your sellers gave permission to disclose. Your right that people will take advantage of that perception. Good job and quick thinking on your part.
Doug, I hope it does help if you do have some clients that end up being in a divorce situation, no need to make the situation worse by losing money also.