Tips For Buyers Still Looking For “A Deal”


The California Association of Realtors (CAR) reports that 84 percent of home buyers use the internet as a significant part of the home buying process, according to its 2009 Survey of California Homebuyers.

“There is so much more information made available to us online, when you go to the actual home, it’s just a validation process for what you’ve seen online,” says Douglas de Jager, co-founder of Dothomes.com another new online listing service.

Browsing for housing on the Internet has become just about as important as having a real estate agent help find a home to buy, but the ease of finding a home on the Net does not guarantee a bargain.

The lack of uniformity in quality control, geographic coverage and search methods from one Web site to another, still often renders the online search less than complete. Plus, most buyer expectations are unrealistic, as many sellers have listened to their Realtor and already aggressively priced their homes.

Here are some things you can look for when bargain shopping-

Look for languishing listings. Heavily discounted homes are 83 percent more likely to have been on the market for 90 days or more. Most sellers will hesitate to accept a low offer if the property has been on the market for only a few weeks.

Find fixer-uppers. Heavily discounted homes are 73 percent more likely to need some fixing up. People who sell homes before fixing them up are usually more concerned about speedy selling than peak price. Get the home inspected before you buy so you know exactly what needs work.

Retreat from remodels. Heavily discounted homes are 20 percent less likely to feature a noteworthy remodel. This also means sellers who sink money into major remodels before they list could be missing out on certain buyers.

Pick properties with pared prices. Homes that are already heavily discounted are 28 percent more likely to already have price reductions. Uh, No Kidding.

Hunt homes with long-time owners. Heavily discounted homes are 52 percent more likely to have been seller-owned for 20 years or more. The longer a seller has owned a property, the more equity he has likely accumulated, and the more likely he is to make significant price concessions.

Put your finger on a flip. On the other hand, heavily discounted homes are 9 percent more likely to have been owned for less than five years. A home owner or investor in trouble may be motivated by the need to quickly reclaim capital, rather than wait for equity growth.

Don’t bank on bigger bargains from bank-owned homes. Heavily discounted homes are 9 percent more likely to be a short sale or bank-owned. Banks lower prices as much as possible from the beginning to unload distressed properties as quickly as possible, but no so much to take more of a loss than is necessary.

And after all that work, call a Realtor to see how much of your info gathering on the internet is accurate/current.

Related posts:

  1. 10 Home Features Buyers Want
  2. North San Diego County HomeDexTM February 2010 Summary Report
  3. Foreclosure Bargains Getting Harder to Find
  4. HUD clarifies the application of realty add-on fees
  5. North San Diego County HomeDexTM January 2010 Summary Report

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This entry was posted on Friday, April 2nd, 2010 at 4:48 pm and is filed under Real Estate News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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