When selling your home, you have many options. One of those options is an investor. Investors come in all shapes and sizes and call themselves by many different names. Whatever they choose to call themselves, they are still investors, and as such, pay lower than market value for your home. After all, if they weren’t going to make money on it, they wouldn’t buy it.
My sister has a friend who recently chose to sell her house to one of those investors. She needed to move quickly, and so she found the choose-your-own-closing-date, no-hassle, no-open-houses, no-blah-blah-blah option appealing. Being a previous realtor and now in the lending industry, she was not shocked that they offered her approximately 80% of the home’s market value. What was shocking was when in the 10-day inspection period, you know the period where the buyer can back out for any reason or no reason at all, they came back with a list of items they wanted repaired and the cost to repair them, what they called “deferred maintenance” of $90,000 to replace the roof, the AC, and other various repairs including the cost to update. Thankfully, because of her previous experience, she was able to negotiate that list and ended up paying $16,000 for the deferred maintenance. That amount came off of their original purchase offer, so she ended up selling her house to them for much less than she could have sold it otherwise.
When selling your home, it is important to know what you are choosing, and have someone who knows the ins and outs of negotiating a purchase contract and who has your best interest at heart.