Homes Selling Before Open House

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The minute the listing alert hit his phone he contacted his realtor who ... arranged a showing the same afternoon.

How do I get these phone alerts without signing a contract with a realtor?

This is a weird market. D.C. housing futures were up 13% last year, but down 10% the previous year. With such low volume, the market is not "hot". Instead, it is illiquid because many owners won't sell and give up their low-interest mortgages. Buyers must be very motivated to choose from such small inventory.

When mortgage rates drop, then a bunch of inventory will hit the market. That should be good news for buyers.

You can just check Redfin or Zillow on Tuesdays.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The minute the listing alert hit his phone he contacted his realtor who ... arranged a showing the same afternoon.

How do I get these phone alerts without signing a contract with a realtor?

This is a weird market. D.C. housing futures were up 13% last year, but down 10% the previous year. With such low volume, the market is not "hot". Instead, it is illiquid because many owners won't sell and give up their low-interest mortgages. Buyers must be very motivated to choose from such small inventory.

When mortgage rates drop, then a bunch of inventory will hit the market. That should be good news for buyers.

I bought my house in McLean in 2018, we started looking in 2017, competition was insane in 2017 and every year since. In McLean, Bethesda, Arlington, Potomac, NW DC and pretty much any good school district etc it has always been like this. In 2018 we viewed the property before the open house and made the offer 2 days prior to the open house.

From my understanding this sort of market competition has now moved to rest of the Fairfax and Montgomery county as well. Desirable houses in good school districts will always have bidding wars, I have been seeing this for the last 7 years and I don’t see any signs of a change.

If you are a serious buyer, you need to modify your strategy.

On the school forum, people say MoCo schools have gone into the toilet. I guess they’re wrong since people still want to live in the MoCo school district.

[Anonymous]

You can buy a house before the open house by arranging a walkthrough beforehand and putting in your offer.

I’m getting a house ready to sell, and potential buyers are already reaching out. It’s not even listed yet.

Investors are especially savvy at this process and network with neighbors and realtors to have lots of eyes on what’s happening in the neighborhood.

[Anonymous]

Echoing others here. We saw the house the day it was on the market, waived all contingencies and made an offer on the next day, sellers accepted the day after that, so the house was on the market for only a few days.

[Anonymous]

My seller has a “broker only” open house on Thursday. It sold at that open house.

[Anonymous]

We had the opposite experience last weekend. Our house went on the market on Friday and we received an offer on Friday with an sizable increase in the price if we signed by 10 pm on Friday. We know our neighborhood is popular and said no but the buyers were welcome to re-submit by the Tuesday noon deadline. They re-submitted and they were the lowest price among the seven offers we received.

This may not be true in every situation, but it was in ours and we can certainly use the extra $115,000 we got for waiting a few more days

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We had the opposite experience last weekend. Our house went on the market on Friday and we received an offer on Friday with an sizable increase in the price if we signed by 10 pm on Friday. We know our neighborhood is popular and said no but the buyers were welcome to re-submit by the Tuesday noon deadline. They re-submitted and they were the lowest price among the seven offers we received.

This may not be true in every situation, but it was in ours and we can certainly use the extra $115,000 we got for waiting a few more days

In hot neighborhoods I can't imagine not waiting through the open house to see how many bids you get.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The minute the listing alert hit his phone he contacted his realtor who ... arranged a showing the same afternoon.

How do I get these phone alerts without signing a contract with a realtor?

This is a weird market. D.C. housing futures were up 13% last year, but down 10% the previous year. With such low volume, the market is not "hot". Instead, it is illiquid because many owners won't sell and give up their low-interest mortgages. Buyers must be very motivated to choose from such small inventory.

When mortgage rates drop, then a bunch of inventory will hit the market. That should be good news for buyers.

Realtor.com populates new listings from the MLS almost immediately. The other sites tend to lag.

[Anonymous]

But no one needs agents, right?! 😂😂😂

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We had the opposite experience last weekend. Our house went on the market on Friday and we received an offer on Friday with an sizable increase in the price if we signed by 10 pm on Friday. We know our neighborhood is popular and said no but the buyers were welcome to re-submit by the Tuesday noon deadline. They re-submitted and they were the lowest price among the seven offers we received.

This may not be true in every situation, but it was in ours and we can certainly use the extra $115,000 we got for waiting a few more days

In hot neighborhoods I can't imagine not waiting through the open house to see how many bids you get.

I agree with this, but it has nothing to do with the open house, it’s just about setting a reasonable deadline so people can schedule showings and pre-inspections. You don’t even need to do an open house.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The minute the listing alert hit his phone he contacted his realtor who ... arranged a showing the same afternoon.

How do I get these phone alerts without signing a contract with a realtor?

This is a weird market. D.C. housing futures were up 13% last year, but down 10% the previous year. With such low volume, the market is not "hot". Instead, it is illiquid because many owners won't sell and give up their low-interest mortgages. Buyers must be very motivated to choose from such small inventory.

When mortgage rates drop, then a bunch of inventory will hit the market. That should be good news for buyers.

How on earth do you think you are going to be able to submit a competitive offer like the one described above without having a relationship with a real estate agent?

[Anonymous]

Open houses are for us nosy neighbors. They may have had a purpose back in the 90s but in modern times I assume it’s only a way to apply pressure for serious buyers who are working on a contract. Or is the way to escalate the price for existing contracts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The minute the listing alert hit his phone he contacted his realtor who ... arranged a showing the same afternoon.

How do I get these phone alerts without signing a contract with a realtor?

This is a weird market. D.C. housing futures were up 13% last year, but down 10% the previous year. With such low volume, the market is not "hot". Instead, it is illiquid because many owners won't sell and give up their low-interest mortgages. Buyers must be very motivated to choose from such small inventory.

When mortgage rates drop, then a bunch of inventory will hit the market. That should be good news for buyers.

Rate cuts have probably been postponed.

[Anonymous]

My parents sold their dc house for substantially over what they or the realtor expected, before open house. Same day as it became available, in March.

I'm pretty removed so I don't know how it all happened, they were quite pleased.

[Anonymous]

It depends on the seller. Some will accept an offer that satisfies them without waiting for other bids, others like to pick and choose. But in any case if you’re a serious buyer it’s foolish to wait until the actual open house. Other parties have usually done their due diligence during the coming soon phase and either have offers submitted or ready to go. Most homes have offer deadlines right after the open house and decisions are made very quickly.