Seller's Market

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Radbird
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Re: Seller's Market

Post by Radbird »

MrCrowesGarden wrote:Y'all can come in August when the Cardinals and Royals play at Kauffman. I fully expect everyone to pitch in and help fix my roof.
I'll bring my tools.
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tlombard
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Re: Seller's Market

Post by tlombard »

Swirls wrote:
Swirls wrote:We closed on our house in mid-April, which had been on the market for just under 2 years. Kind of an oddity though because in general houses in the Twin Cities metro usually sell really quickly. Ours is a 5 acre waterfront log cabin in the south metro, and perhaps a 30 minute drive to either downtown St Paul or Minneapolis.

It basically sat on the market because buyers were afraid of having to do maintenance every couple years on the exterior since it's a log home. The seller had slowly lowered the price over $100k from when it first went on the market in May 2016, and then in January started lowering it another $5k every week or two. We pounced on it, knowing that houses in good condition in the south metro with 5 acres literally don't exist unless they're approaching $1 million. This house was built in 1993, and had all of the appliances replaced in 2010, including the well and septic pump.

We closed in just over 30 days, and found out a couple days after closing that the seller didn't disclose a large settlement with the gas company to turn our entire front yard and 1/2 of our land into an access road for a pipeline project being done this summer and next year. It never came up in the title search because it's not technically an easement (there's an existing easement for the original pipeline that was installed 90 years ago), it's a legal settlement for future use of the land. Roughly 10-15 adult trees will be removed as part of this as well. The gas company will "restore" the land after they're done, so we won't have a giant [expletive] 30 foot wide road forever in our front yard, but they're just going to put grass seed down and maybe plant a couple young trees.

We've met with our real estate attorney a couple times now, and will be suing the seller to recoup the monies for future use of the land as well as likely a bunch of restoration stuff and horse barn rental fees (our plan was to move my wife's horse to the pasture land, but that land is now going to be occupied by this [expletive] access road - since even once it's restored, it will be a year or two before the land is viable for horse pasture, we're looking at at least $7500 in barn rental fees for two years).

So our current house qualifies as one of those "too good to be true things." Get a house for $350k that should be selling for $450 or $500k, and immediately find out that it's going to be subjected to a giant construction project that was never disclosed because it was a private settlement.
The "demand" letter has finally been sent to the seller from our attorney. She has 10 days to pay us the money received from the gas company for the land as well as one year's worth of barn boarding fees, or she will receive a formal lawsuit.
Good luck! Hopefully they just pay up.

tlombard
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Re: Seller's Market

Post by tlombard »

Arthur Dent wrote:
tlombard wrote:Anyway, the people who backed out actually had the nerve to try and get their earnest money back. There is no way my brother is giving that back and if the house doesn't get sold quickly again, it looks like he's going to have to seriously consider suing them for breaking the contract. That just sounds like a huge pain.
When my wife sold her condo, she had to threaten to keep the earnest money, which was enough to finalize the sale.

Dunno the situation there, but I would just keep the earnest money (that's what it's for) and move on. Suing seems like a good way to make the situation far worse and endanger your ability to sell at all.

Edit: I suspect asking for earnest money back may just be standard realtor advice. Why not ask for your money back? You might get lucky and get it.
It definitely doesn't hurt to ask and I agree that suing may not be the best option. He's trying to avoid it and I think the only way it comes down to that is if they absolutely can't sell the house again for a long time. With a wife and two kids having to move to another state and not be able to buy another house because the people backed out... it is definitely a hardship. They had no choice on moving, the Coast Guard is making him rotate out so they just have to go. They are just really lucky that they have a place to stay thanks to the family friend. They are paying some rent but thankfully the family friend is giving them a good enough deal that it won't kill them short term if they can't get the house sold. They can't stay there forever though.

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Tim
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Re: Seller's Market

Post by Tim »

Seems we were too proud of our house
Dropping the price
Also got feedback on my man cave with cards and Hogs memorabilia on the walls. Men loved it, wives hated it. We’ve since made the room “gender neutral”

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MrCrowesGarden
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Re: Seller's Market

Post by MrCrowesGarden »

I’m officially a homeowner.

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IMADreamer
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Re: Seller's Market

Post by IMADreamer »

MrCrowesGarden wrote:I’m officially a homeowner.

Nice, congratulations!

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Tim
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Re: Seller's Market

Post by Tim »

MrCrowesGarden wrote:I’m officially a homeowner.
Congrats!

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G. Keenan
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Re: Seller's Market

Post by G. Keenan »

MrCrowesGarden wrote:I’m officially a homeowner.
Awesome dude, congrats!

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CardsofSTL
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Re: Seller's Market

Post by CardsofSTL »

Congrats MCG...I'll send you a potted plant.

tlombard
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Re: Seller's Market

Post by tlombard »

CardsofSTL wrote:Congrats MCG...I'll send you a potted plant.
I read that as pot plant at first and was pretty sure you shouldn't be putting that out there publicly.

Reading comprehension is hard.

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