The real estate market in San Jose is hot! Homes are "flying off the shelf." As the owner of a San Jose home you may think it is such a strong seller's market why should I pay so many thousands of dollars to a San Jose real estate agent when I can find the buyer myself.
Well, I can tell you a story about just one of the things that can happen when a San Jose home owner decides to try to do it herself. These are not all the things that can possibly go wrong, just what happened to one poor San Jose for sale by owner seller.
So Ms For Sale by Owner from Blossom Valley in San Jose inherited a home from her mother a few months ago. Mom was ill at the end of her life and dies with no money, just a home with a mortgage. The mortgage was 6 months past due when Ms For Sale By Owner decided she would try to preserve what equity was left so she decided to try to sell the house herself.
Ms For Sale by Owner put the home on Zillow and found a buyer. After Ms For Sale By Owner agreed to the price and terms with the Mr Buyer with No Agent a friend of Ms For Sale By Owner who works at a law firm advised her to call me to handle the paper work. Now this is not something I normally do, but I agreed since it was a referral from a law firm that I work with a lot. I agreed to write up the contract and provide the disclosures for the seller, but not to represent the buyer.
So I wrote up a contract which gave the Mr Buyer Without an Agent 17 days to do any additional inspections he desired, 17 days for his loan approval, and a very clear addendum saying I was not his agent. I explained nothing to him.
At the end of 17 days I gave Mr Buyer Without an Agent a contingency removal to sign which he did.
A week later when I asked his lender when the loan docs would be drawn I was told that Mr Buyer Without An Agent had to sell his mobile home to get the down payment to buy Ms For Sale By Owner's Blossom Valley house. The first buyer backed out but he had an all cash back up buyer so we were just waiting for the mobile home park to approve the buyer for the open house. Guess what, that buyer backs out also.
So Ms For Sale By Owner has to cancel the contract with Mr Buyer Without An Agent. Mr Buyer Without An Agent had breached his contract. The contract was never written with a contingency on the sale of another property. Mr Buyer without an Agent signed a contingencies removal removing all contingencies. If he had an agent he would not have done that. He may lose his deposit now.
Ms For Sale By Owner has now lost 6 weeks of time that the mortgage is past due and not paid off. The bank has been patient, but there is nothing from stopping the bank from recording a Notice of Default which will cost her even more money.
Ms For Sale By Owner has learned her lesson. We are signing a new listing agreement and the new buyer will have an agent or their offer will not be accepted.
So in this case, no one won by trying to do a "for sale by owner" in San Jose. This is just one example on how trying to save some money can make you lose more than you thought you could save. In other words, friends don't let friends buy or sell houses without a good agent.
If you are looking for a good real estate agent in the Silicon Valley please feel free to contact me.
Marcy Moyer
Keller Williams Realty
www.marcymoyer.com
marcy@marcymoyer.com
DRE 01191194
650-619-9285
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