You've found the perfect home and
are ready to put in an offer to purchase. First, you
should review our section on
negotiations. Now
that you are familiar with the negotiations process, you will
work with your agent to review the comparable sales in the area
and the other active homes on the market. Now you are
ready to determine your offer price, closing date, terms, and
conditions. Your offer will need to be in writing and signed by
all of the buying parties. Your offer is considered
submitted when it is delivered to the seller or their
representative.
The seller now has the option to respond in one of the following
ways:
1. Accept the offer as is thus creating a contract.
2. Counter the offer with different terms and
conditions.
3. Reject or decline the offer.
4. Do nothing.
Worth noting is that you have given the power of acceptance to
the seller, meaning that the seller can sign the offer, and
deliver a copy to you creating a legally binding contract
between you and the seller. If you decide to terminate the
contract, you will have to do so in accordance to the terms of
the contract. If you decide to withdraw your offer before
the seller signs it and delivers it to you, you would do this by
notifying the seller that you are rescinding your offer.
Response #4 is worth some additional discussion. Sometimes
a buyer thinks that a seller is legally required to respond to
all offers. In Texas, this is not the case. It is
the sellers legal right to ignore the offer and do nothing.
Another thing that can be frustrating to a buyer is that they
may want the seller to respond by a certain time or date.
An agent may even include a provision in the offer stating that
the buyer request a response by a certain time. While most
sellers will try and comply with reasonable request, they are
not obligated to do so.
Finally, lets talk briefly about the number of counter offers.
There is no limit to how many times two parties can counter back
and forth, however in practice excessive counter offers will
usually upset one party and they may withdraw from the
negotiations. There is no magic number of counters and
each situation is different, but the majority of contracts are
reached within 1 to 3 counter offers.
Your agent will provide guidance on the offer and negotiation
process and make suggestions approaches that can help you reach
an agreement with the seller.