With the London Ontario real estate market turning, so are buyers & sellers. Buyers are flexing their power & sellers are pushing back.
When it was a seller’s market in London, buyers were saying sellers were greedy, which may be so in some cases. Yet, in my experience with my sellers who sold, we listed their homes at market prices, and ten to fifteen buyer offers later drove the price up, do you blame the seller?
In the current market, if a house or condo is priced at market, some buyers are merciless with their expectations and their perception of a home’s value. Some are thinking they can buy a home at 80-85% of the asking price and are amazed that the seller refuses! Duh!
In two instances this week, I have had buyers looking at a $1,300,000 beautiful house, and their Realtor called me and said, hey, my buyer is qualified by the bank for $1 million; we can offer $950,000 because we need money for closing and moving costs. The other says, without seeing the home yet, if we would take $1,050,000! Really, oh and conditional on financing, a home inspection, a 120-day close and most likely a few other conditions like the sky must be blue when we move in, the neighbours have no pets, go to bed at 8:00 PM so we can party and they don’t bother us and blah, blah, blah! (I’ll jump right on it)
Will the market balance out? Yes, just as we went from a seller’s market to a buyer’s market, there will be fewer sellers in a few months, for they will wait just like some buyers waited; we will then see some balance, and then we will get back to a reasonable market.
The rise in interest rates is a good thing; it has tamed the market and hopefully prevented some potential buyers from foolishly getting into situations they cannot afford. As well, Realtors who thought they were the Kings and Queens of real estate because their listings sold in one day with multiple offers or their buyers would pay any price for a home is now finding out it takes skill, experience and work to help a buyer or seller in a transaction!
That means a Realtor can’t just plop a sign on a lawn, and the house sells; they will have to talk to other Realtors, learn how to talk to their seller about no offers after seven days, learn how to market and how to budget their money, for there will be less coming in!
Aaaah! The real world again!
