A deadline on an offer to buy a house can backfire if there is more than one offer and if the deadline is 24 hours or less.
Sometimes buyers want to put a deadline on an offer to buy a house thinking they will get a faster response from the seller. Sellers may not be available or in the case of an estate, there may be four or five sellers.
The listing agent may be at parent-teacher conferences or a child soccer match. There could be a death in the seller’s family.
Buyers who put short deadlines in offers should understand that they risk losing the opportunity to buy a house. We are still in a seller’s market.
When offers come in over the weekend I have had seller’s agents tell me that “we always wait until Monday to accept an offer” and some say that it is always best to deal with the offers on Sunday night.
Great offers tend to get faster responses than not-so-great offers. If the house just came on the market and the offer is for less than the asking price chances are sellers are not going to accept it right away and rather than negotiating, they will wait a few days for a better offer.
During the last buyers’ market, things were very different. Buyers had the upper hand. For the last few years, a strong seller’s market has given the sellers the upper hand.
As a general rule responses of any kind do not happen during the day. They happen between 8:30 PM and 1:00 AM.
Home buyers can withdraw their offer while waiting for sellers to respond.
Once a seller does accept the offer it is important to keep things moving along because until the contract is signed and executed it is easy for sellers to accept another offer.
Sometimes patience pays off and the buyer who is willing to wait a few days may end up being the buyer who gets to buy the house.
Every situation is unique. Buyers should ask their agent for advice on how long to wait for a response on an offer from the seller.
