Friends, Broker, Homesellers: lend me your house.

by Ron Rothenberg, 4 Buyers Real Estate

Usually the buyers I work for have a bit of time. If we can’t see a house one day, we’ll see it the next, though frequently we just move on and never see the houses that were unavailable on the first day.

Recently I had some relocating buyers. They had a very short timeline, just a few days to see houses in four different towns. They were realistic, and realized that they didn’t have the time to get a wonderful deal, but wanted to make the best choice they could in about a week, even though it meant paying a bit more than the house was worth.

Most of the towns they were looking in are ones where the current real estate market is very heated – good houses are getting snatched up in a few days, and there’s not a lot of inventory to look at. But there were a few houses in this, just seven that were still available, according to the MLS, so I set out to show them a few of those.

To my surprise, most of the remaining homes weren’t easy to see. On two, the seller had set restrictions on what hours the house could be shown, one having only two 2-hour windows per week to show the house. Three required the listing broker to accompany our showing, even if the house was vacant. On another, the listing broker just wasn’t around, she was on vacation and not returning calls.

Why were these houses the leftovers in an otherwise hot town? Some were a bit overpriced, some were ugly or small, but others looked as if they were nice houses, but we’ll never know, since we couldn’t see them.

Please, Mr. & Mrs. Seller, don’t lock ready, willing and able buyers out. Make your home available to us. If it’s a nice home at a fair price, I’d be happy to help my buyers buy it, if only you’ll let us in.