Me too! And that house is such an eyesore that only CB can bring it back to its former glory!!! 
I also find it odd that an investor ordered a termite inspection and report also. Unless they required it from the seller. The whole thing is odd. Investors don’t hire a bunch of people to do inspections and don’t drag out contingency periods.
My guess is it is a wholesaler who locked it into a long escrow and is shopping out the contract. A wholesaler might order some reports to send out to potential investors on their list.
I’m an RE investor and would have no reason NOT to order a termite inspection on a property I was interested in buying.
Isnt that what a savvy buyer, who is not local and cant crawl underneath on his own, should have done ??
I dont understand why this is considered unusual…
@menloparkmom - you are investor, not a flipper. Big difference.
I thought the massive termite damage was readily apparent without a professional inspection. My thought is they are going to go back to the seller with the report to try to knock down the price which the sellers won’t like and then it will fall back to CB.
Agree. That inspection was done to get the $$ amount justification for bargaining. Can’t tell the seller to drop the price by so much just because there signs of termite damage - it could be a few bucks to fix or it could be $20k. I am sure CB would have figured that our without any special reports. Fingers crossed for the chicken house!
Yes, there’s a difference between a flipper and an investor who is going to hold the property. I am using the term loosely here just to indicate that the buyer is not a homeowner who is going to repair the house and live in it. The listing agent says that the offer says All CASH but he’s pretty sure that the investor is scrambling to line up hard money loans which will be recorded on the property during the transaction. I was able to submit Proof of Funds that showed all the cash in the bank (even though I would also be scrambling for hard money loans to buy this). I’m not sure if the other buyer provided legitimate proof of funds. Difference is that I h ave already lined up my loans and they are waiting in the wings for me to find a property.
A flipper would not waste their time calling for termite inspections because they should be able to inspect a house themselves, unless there was something unusual that required special review. Sometimes I will ask my roofer to stop by and crawl around a roof to give me a good estimate of roofing costs because I am not good at estimating roof costs. Well, I’ve proven already that I’m not good at estimating anything at this point !!!
My method is to be very aware that there is significant termite damage and estimate for having to tear apart the roof, fascia, siding, etc and repair every single piece of wood that has termites. My goal is to get every termite out of the house before I call for a final termite inspection and try to avoid the cost of fumigating the entire thing (which I was successful at Del Monte and Liberace House)
This investor must be gathering up a bunch of work estimates to double check his costs for fixing the house (or getting ready to submit a big request for credit against his offer price).
The buyer is local, so I don’t think it is an issue of someone trying to buy the house from out of town.
I hate to use the term “flipper” when talking about CB. She is a neighborhood blight eradicator. The savvy developers and flippers in our neck of the woods pounce on properties quickly. No inspections or any other contingencies - they are good at guesstimating their costs. And they put pressure on the sellers by checking the 24 hr reply box on any offer.
I would think that $12,000 is a lot of money to spend if the buyer isn’t serious.
$12k is the repair estimate. The inspection was not more than a few hundred bucks. If the buyer’s agent communicates to the seller what inspection uncovered and how much it costs, IMO, it signals that further price negotiations will follow. If I were the seller, I would say no and wait for them to walk away then go with the other interested party.
^ cb said her bid is $40K lower. Hate to be a pessimist, but unless they come back asking for a lot more than $12K off, the owners are not going to go to a different buyer.
I have a feeling CB might have some wiggle room. Plus, the agent is sitting on both chairs, so to speak.
I have just reviewed the termite report. The report was ordered by the agent on behalf of the Seller. Cost for inspection was $80. I’m guessing agent told Seller they have to provide report for disclosure reasons. But the report has dozens of x’s where drywood and subterranean termite activity was found.
The interesting thing is Seller (and possibly buyer) have $12k on their mind. The report has 3 or 4 key areas where termite company clearly states “must be repaired by licensed contractor”. These are the huge areas of cost where compromised ceiling rafters and beams are damaged and all the ceiling boards. You could easily add another $10k to that.
And termite company is requiring drilling into concrete foundation to eradicate subterranean termites. In the fine print noone ever notices that termite company is not responsible for cosmetic damage or painting anything. I’ve seen termite company cheap repairs. On one house they slapped up t1 11 siding with seams going the wrong way!!
As @BunsenBurner said above…very unusual for a serious investor to have any contingencies or long escrow. Something is a little off
The listing agent says he is not representing the other buyer. This means he should have wiggle room in his commission charged to Seller if he wanted to make the deal. My guess is I could possibly only be about $25k off
Just calculated…if he does the right thing (standard in industry) I’m only $16,500 off.
From what you’ve said about this agent, I’m not convinced he would necessarily “do the right thing.”
I’m not sure I would count on this agent…unless he NEEDS you. He has proven that he isn’t exactly a good communicator.
TBH…I hope another good deal,comes along so you can tell this agent to take a hike.
The grandma cracker box that I inspected on Tivoli just came back on the market. It was listed for $995k and my carpenter and I inspected it. I talked to listing agent and he told me they were going to spend $10k cleaning it up (probably draining strange above ground pool and removing yard debris) so that a homeowner could get a loan. He told me he had a buyer at full price.
Well he doesn’t have a buyer anymore:)
And…on the small house in Wooded Area asking $895k the same agent took property off market (told me it could be had for $900k) and re listed for $995k but its still active after 10 days at new price. Not understanding the logic on that strategy.
There is a whole lot of dumb realtors out there!..
The agents tell you what they think you want to hear…to sell their properties. Sometimes…it’s just garbage. CB…you know how,to,sift through the BS and the realities.