I bought last summer and we started above asking, with an escalation clause, and the escalation clause was not triggered by the competing offer. No escalation at all.

We sold in 2019. Priced at $675, escalated to $690 in increments of $5k, but highest escalation would have gone above $700. Since the other maxed out a little below $690, that’s what the final price was. It didn’t feel slimy to me.

When we sold our house, we didn't trigger the escalation to max. Listed at 845 ... escalated to 885 ... and their clause would have gone over $1M.

They basically re-used the bid for another house where they had lost, and escalated way above what our house was worth, figuring (I assume) that at least would guarantee they'd win ... and they did.

Our winning offer -- last Spring -- was $50k below our max escalation.

Anonymous wrote:Yes I have. Twice actually.

Google really tells you nothing. I am sure that the names on the other offer are names of real people. The question is whether they were actually legitimate buyers who would have bought that property if you didn't. I'm afraid there is no easy way to find that out.

If you are all cash, waiving all contingencies, and offering a quick close, in an area where VA loans are common by a military base, is there a reason to escalate beyond next best? I was thinking to just offer to … match next highest offer up to a cap. If even.

I won with an escalation that didn't go to the max. Also, the buyer who won our house when we sold was $10k short of their max.

Yes I have. Twice actually.

Google the bidders that triggered your escalation.

Anonymous wrote:Exactly. Feels statistically unlikely that each time the next highest bidder was just below our max. Not impossible, but seems unlikely.

Curious to hear from anyone whose escalation clause DID NOT max out in order to win the bid. Are there a lot of you out there?

We had an escalation that was not taken to our max. I think the escalation went up to $1.3M on a house listed at $1.2 and we paid $1.255. This was two years ago so it was competitive but not 2021 competitive. They showed us the offer where the other buyer had maxed at $1.25

When we purchased a year ago, we lost out on multiple offers where we escalated to our max. Our winning offer did NOT escalate to the maximum - IIRC we ended up ~18k below our max (932 out of 950)

We bought late last year.

Our escalation maxed @100k above asking.

Another offer with essentially identical terms escalated 250k above asking (only difference was we had a 10d faster close time).
We saw their offer. It was totally legit as we recognized the person as our tours overlapped and we googled them once we saw their other offer and their pic was on their LinkedIn account.

The seller, instead of trying to get us up more or the other party up more, took our offer at max escalation.

Why? Because they felt we’d continue caring for the home (said this in our offer letter) vs turn it into a McMansion and piss off the neighbors.

While the sellers still made out like bandits, not every last decision is about money.

FWIW, we felt the same way for a while and lost 6 escalations in a row with high caps. And then we "won" even when our escalation was exceeded for 40k by another one (copy was shared of other escalation page) because seller felt we were stronger overall.

OP, if you’re suspicion is that some agents are shady and unethical, you’re right. I think shady behavior to max out escalation clauses happens quite frequently.

House priced at 1.349, our escalation was 1.5, it stopped at 1.460. But I kinda get it because people tend to gove similar offers, your max probably isnt like 1235 but a round number, I think that’s way.