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Last winter, a mutual friend introduced me to Brian, who was thinking about moving back to St. Louis after a 40 year hiatus out west and many places in between. We met for the 1st time over the phone with the standard “starting a house search” conversation. “When do you need to move by?” “How much do you want to spend?” “What part of town do you want to live in?” Brian’s price point and preferred location alone were going to be tough to find, THEN add in the fact he needed to sell his house before purchasing a new one. Side note: a house sale contingent offer is rarely accepted in today’s low inventory seller’s market-much less a house sale contingent where the house to be sold isn’t on the market yet or under contract! Nonetheless, I felt a glimmer of hope and we scheduled a time to go see some houses. Our 1st tour was…depressing. From what I recall it was a biting cold gray early spring day and we saw a bunch of duds. Even if the house had some potential, none were a great fit-plus, many of the homes were overrun with other prospective buyers. Our 1st tour was a fast reality check that his wish list might just be that-a wish. Brian came to town 3 more times last year, checking out ALL of the options; New construction, historic builds, city bungalows, county ranches, condos- north, south, east, and, west and even further west…we were covering ALL of the bases. This winter, I got the call that Brian was ready to list his house for sale. A month later, he had a closing date on his house in New Mexico. Not to say we weren’t covering any ground before, but our house search here just amped up and became more laser focused and intense. A few weeks later, 20+ houses scheduled to view, 2 days in a row plus a few thrown in the night before and the day after. We had hopes that we would find at least one house in our 2 day search. We saw 1 the 1st day, but the location was not ideal. We also saw some major doozies; terrible foundations, crazy dirty and outdated-until our last house of the 2nd day. By this time we were both feeling frayed and fried out. We were skeptical of this house because it was listed by a company that notoriously has listings with something REALLY wrong with them that can’t easily be changed; like located at the bottom of a hill with a stream running into the house, or giant dead trees surrounding the house with the roots pushing through the basement floor. We walked in when the sun was setting with low expectations. Our expectations were quickly met than exceeded! Move in ready√ Great location√ Desired house style√ Right price√ We were under contract the next day…and then we weren’t. The building inspections showed why this house was on the market still. You know all of those little things you don’t notice when first looking at a house? Well there were hundreds of those “little things” that were going to cost thousands bringing this house past Brian’s comfort level in how much he was going to have to invest to make this house truly livable. We terminated the contract and were both looking at another house hunt marathon because Brian was going to be homeless in 4 weeks-YIKES! To our surprise, the selling broker approached us and asked what they could do to get Brian to stay with the offer. They offered a price reduction-it wasn’t enough. They offered another reduction-it was better, but still not enough. Then they offered a 3rd reduction…this one made up for all of the extra work that was needed-we had a deal again! The house originally was listed $100k’s more than where we finally ended and closed at…now that is a price drop! What is the point of this story? It is going to sound cliche, but sometimes the time and effort put forth will be repaid at the end. Brian and I saw well over 50 houses in 2 counties and 25+ municipalities. We started the search 1 plus years ago and methodically started weeding out houses and locations until we funneled in on Brian’s preferred location, house style and price point! Here’s what Brian had to say: "I had a wonderful experience working with Dede as my realtor. When choosing a realtor, you never know how the experience will be. However, with Dede, everything was as good as it can get. She was very patient and helped me diligently throughout the buying process. We explored various neighborhoods, which helped me decide the area I wanted to live. Since I was new to the area, I needed guidance, and Dede provided that” Do you or someone you know have real estate they want to buy or sell, but don’t know where to start? I am here to bring clarity. In Love & Light & Sometimes you don’t need a crystal ball to see the future if you’re steadfast and a realist ~ Dede ~
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