I lost 2 deals in the same day last month to other offers. This is surely not uncommon but the details didn't make sense.

Offer #1 was a decent offer submitted on a foreclosure in Burton. At the time of submission, there was neither activity nor offers on it. I called every couple of days to check on it and was assured it had been submitted and no other offers had come in. After about two weeks I got a counter. My buyer countered back. We were only a few thousand apart and it should have been a done deal. A week later I recieved a notice of multiple offers and a request for highest and best. I was furious. We had already begun to negotiate. Had the bank not been so slow to respong we would have come to terms a week ago. Had my offer been held for weeks in hopes of another offer that would instigage both offers being driven up? That is the only explanation I can come up with. It stinks on so many levels but I'm not going into that right now. At that moment I simply accepted that the agents and/or banks are able to do whatever they want and I would have to adapt accordingly.

Offer #2 came about that same evening. Earlier in the day I had called ahead to see if there was any activity or offers on the house I wanted to show. The Buyer was very serious and would likely be writing on it that night. I was told that one offer had come in just that day but that it had not yet been submitted and that she (the agent) would hold onto it and submit them together. Cool. This is what we normally do, repo or not if we know another offer is coming in. PLUS it was right in line with the lesson I had learned on Offer #1.

I showed the house that night, the buyer loved it, and told me to write it up full price. It was a great house at 25k. I called the agent to tell her about our full price offer and she told me that not only had she already submitted that other offer but that the bank had already countered and the people were accepting it.

WHAT?!

The whole showing and evening was a waste of everyone's time. When I reminded the agent that I called ahead and didn't want to show the house if it aready had an offers in negotiation, she acted like I was crazy. When I reminded her that she said she wasn't going to submit the other offer yet, she said, "well, I can't do that."

First of all YOU SAID YOU WERE GOING TO! Second of all, all the other banks are doing it, why can't you?

Offer #1 illustrates that offers are being held, for weeks in that case, and accepting more offers.

Offer #2 illustrates that the offer must be presented and dealt with immediately.

So what's the truth? I seriously am not interested in hearing anything about how the agents have to do what the bank tells them. I want to know what the RULE is. What is the universal protocol of submitting bank offers. If we could understand what is SUPPOSED to be going on, we, as agents, could represent our clients more efficiently and know when bad moves are being made so that we can deal with and make accountable those who don't act accordingly. Unless that is the reason no one WANTS us to know....

SO! Calling all REPO peeps! PLEASE tell us how you decide to stop taking offers. And if it is all the way up until the bank responds, then please explain why in the world it would take a bank 2 weeks to respond to a decent offer. Here's your chance. We all hate dealing with you... and I'll just say it... we think you are up to no good. Please prove us wrong and help us understand the way things are SUPPOSED to be done.

OMG ANOTHER DISCLAIMER: The opinions expressed by REBA are shared by everyone she has ever known but due to politics and keeping bridges constructed, these views are probably not supported by ChangingStreets.com. Nor do they apply to REPO SUAVE who is a scrupulous, ethical,and handsome man.