Yesterday I got a mail from some company wanting to buy my house quickly. Normally I would just toss this and not think anything else of it. However, they offered between 230k-280k for houses in the area “like” mine. I’m almost 100% sure that my house is not worth the 230k, I would say that it’s closer to 200+.
They were also willing to pay all the closing costs, there would be no agent fee since there would be no agents, this I can understand. They even offered to let us stay in the house for free, pay for moving costs, and a lot of other options as well.
This left me thinking, well if they really want to pay more then what I think the house is worth, and pay for all the other things as well then why shouldn’t I? Iris and I would like to start a family in the near future and the current house is not big enough for more then one child. We could take the money, buy a bigger house before the interest rates go up to where it would be harder to find something.
So what’s the catch? Are they offering more then they are willing to actually pay and when we call they say, well we will only offer you 190. Are they going to take forever to actually get us the money even though they say it can happen in seven days? Are they thieves wanting to come look at the house? There has to be some catch with them, I see TV ads and road signs for the same types of places.
Or is this legit and my house is worth more then I think it is. If so that means it’s gone up by almost 100k in two years. It just seems too good to be true, which usually means it is.
They are casting a net to find homeowners in difficult situations such as pending foreclosures, homes in poor condition, etc. A house that I owned needed extensive repairs and was in a very rough neighborhood. I needed to sell it, but was not able to find a buyer. I finally sold it to an investor who specialized in distressed properties. His intention was to fix it up and resell it. I took somewhat of a beating, but was able to get rid of the house.
Are these the ones with the cheezy cardboard “We give cash for houses!” signs? I always wondered where the “We give marshmallows for houses!” people were…
I work in real estate. The ones we’ve had contact with get an appraisal done on your property by their appraiser and then offer you 50 to 70 percent of the appraised value.
Around here, they use billboards that say “We buy ugly houses.” Now, they’ve got a caveman mascot called “Ug”, so the billboards now say “Ug buys ugly houses.”
From what I understand, they pay less than what you could probably get were you to sell by traditional means, but they are geared towards people who wish to sell quickly without having to make repairs, etc. They then make the repairs and resell the house for a profit.
It is possible that house prices in your area have gone up that much, though (one of the reasons why some economists are predicting a real estate “bubble” that will eventually burst). I bought my house in 2002, and the house next door is for sale now. They are asking for about $65K more than what we paid for our house. Of course, it’s been on the market for a couple of months now…that would have been quite unusual in 2002 around here. So, they are probably asking too much.
Or, it could be that potential buyers are scared off by the fact that their damn attic is infested with squirrels (you can see where the squirrels have chewed a hole in the eaves of the house from our deck…they patched the hole at one point, but apparently without calling a damn exterminator to get rid of the squirrels, because they are back, and I’ve seen baby squirrel heads sticking out of that hole!) So, who knows…maybe they’ll be calling “Ug” soon. They aren’t even living there anymore at this point.
Well I know it can’t be 50% of the house value, and while I know houses are doing very well, mine is very small. There is nothing wrong with it, and the area is nice so I wouldn’t have a problem selling it. I’m just very suprised at the price. That means that it’s gone up by a good 65% in just two years.
This maybe a good thing for me then since we do want a bigger house at some point in the future. I wouldn’t go this route, but it is nice to know.
The letter said they pay that much for houses “like” yours. It’s likely that every other owner in your neighborhood got the same letter, no matter what kind of house you have.
Our local newspaper investigated them a couple of months ago. From what they were able to find out, they’re legitimate, but like Tamex says, they’re geared to people who want to sell quickly and not invest the time or money in fixing the house up to get top dollar.
If you’re really interested in selling, you can either get your house appraised, or make friends with a traditional real estate agent who factors in the neighborhood, what kind of shape the propertiy’s in and truly “comparable” sales to make an educated guess of your house’s market value.