Blog: We're Under Contract!
Menu
We're Under Contract! - Saturday, May 25, 2024
The last week has been a flurry of activity for the home selling process. We had open houses on Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday a week ago. We stayed at the nearby Granada Inn from Friday to Wednesday in order to leave the house vacant for the open houses as well as the private tours with people coming by with their agents. On Friday, we had a private tour that was scheduled at the last minute and we were running around trying to get stuff straightened out and were out the door one minute before the tour's start time. We saw what looked like an agent waiting in his car; he was probably shaking his head at these people who obviously didn't have it together.
On both Saturday and Sunday, we had 30-35 people come by the house. Our agent Susanna said that a few people from Saturday came back Sunday to take a second look, so that was a good sign. Based on conversations with buyer's agents, she had expected 5-6 offers. We had priced low ("only" 1.569 million) in order to attract more bids, and in the end we had 4 offers, though she didn't bother mentioning one of them since it was too low - "just" 1.65 million, even though it was a cash offer. We also had an early offer of 1.68 on Thursday, but we turned it down because we thought we could get more by seeing the process through.
So this past Wednesday, when offers were due, we had basically 3 offers to choose from: Offer 1 at 1.68 million, Offer 2 at 1.71, and Offer 3 at 1.83. The third offer was by far the best, but they had opted for 3 days to transfer the deposit to escrow, which Susanna said was too long and needed to be changed to 1 day. I thought the 3 days indicated that the buyers might have another bid on another property and were considering backing out of ours. Offer 1 was from a couple who work at Google who stopped by Thursday morning before the open house and chatted briefly with me when I was outside sweeping. They've been renting in the area for 10 years and they're familiar with our neighborhood. I told Susanna that I'd be fine with giving it to them for 1.75 since Offer 3 didn't seem like a sure thing, but she told me to wait.
Susanna got Offer 1 to increase their bid to 1.828, and similarly she got Offer 2 increased to 1.825. She also got Offer 3 to change their terms to specify just 1 day to transfer the deposit. So now we had three comparable offers and were leaning towards giving it to the Google couple since we liked them. However, Susanna then sent us another update saying that Offer 3 had been increased to 1.85! Offer 3 was also giving us a month of rent back for free. So this was the best offer overall, especially since they had offered such a high amount to begin with, so we accepted that one. As much as we liked the Google couple, we were also concerned that the amount they would be paying for the down payment was nearly all of the amount in their proof of funds. It felt like they were getting emotionally tied up and probably bidding more than would be good for them long-term. Though it benefited us, I felt bad that Susanna got the buyers into a bidding war. I guess she was just doing her job and this is just how the market is, though. There's a reason why houses are going for this much in our area. And our area is still cheaper than Sunnyvale, Mountain View, Cupertino, etc.
At the end of the day on Thursday, after an agonizing wait, Susanna informed us that the buyers had taken a cashier's check to escrow and that we were now under contract. Whew! We're really blessed to have gotten such a high offer, and we're blessed that the process has been so smooth and that we have a shrewd agent who knows the market and knew what improvements to make to have our house appeal to today's buyers. We'd had doubts about whether anybody would want our house and whether it would even go for 1.6 or 1.7 million, so this has totally exceeded our expectations.
We're supposed to close escrow within 21 days, so we'll probably move around the end of June. We want to move down sooner so that we can start touring houses in SoCal. The hardest part is over and we're in the waiting period, but we've been trying to do small things like pull weeds so that the buyers don't think this place is terrible and get buyer's remorse when they move in.
We've also been spending more time with old friends from church. So far we've done dinner with Ryan and Steph (they bought us El Pollo Loco), dinner with Uncle Kenway and Aunt Susan and their family, dinner at Google with Tracy, dinner with Ruth and Albert with Richard and Michelle joining, dinner with Jerry and Vivian (she's an amazing cook), and brunch today with Tim and Irene. Coming up, we have dinner plans with James and Charlotte, a going away party with people from previous Family Fellowship groups organized by Emily, a going away get-together with the people on our worship team, a Korean BBQ meal with Jeff and Eleanor since we won their service auction, and a meal with Jean and Brion that we'll have to coordinate when they get back from traveling. Plus probably a final hangout with Tracy and my uncles and aunts, respectively. It's too bad that we're only spending time with people now that we're leaving. When we're in a new place, we need to be more intentional about meeting with others and cultivating relationships.
For now, we're enjoying a little bit of respite and a slower (but more intentional) pace of life. Priscilla and I did our annual hike at Mission Peak yesterday, followed by dinner at an old favorite, Layang Layang in Milpitas. I ran at Rancho with Yang last Saturday, and I trained at the park today and last Saturday with Joe and Wilson; we have our Monterey Spartan 5k coming up next weekend. We're learning to make the most of our time as our time in the Bay Area is rapidly coming to an end.
On both Saturday and Sunday, we had 30-35 people come by the house. Our agent Susanna said that a few people from Saturday came back Sunday to take a second look, so that was a good sign. Based on conversations with buyer's agents, she had expected 5-6 offers. We had priced low ("only" 1.569 million) in order to attract more bids, and in the end we had 4 offers, though she didn't bother mentioning one of them since it was too low - "just" 1.65 million, even though it was a cash offer. We also had an early offer of 1.68 on Thursday, but we turned it down because we thought we could get more by seeing the process through.
So this past Wednesday, when offers were due, we had basically 3 offers to choose from: Offer 1 at 1.68 million, Offer 2 at 1.71, and Offer 3 at 1.83. The third offer was by far the best, but they had opted for 3 days to transfer the deposit to escrow, which Susanna said was too long and needed to be changed to 1 day. I thought the 3 days indicated that the buyers might have another bid on another property and were considering backing out of ours. Offer 1 was from a couple who work at Google who stopped by Thursday morning before the open house and chatted briefly with me when I was outside sweeping. They've been renting in the area for 10 years and they're familiar with our neighborhood. I told Susanna that I'd be fine with giving it to them for 1.75 since Offer 3 didn't seem like a sure thing, but she told me to wait.
Susanna got Offer 1 to increase their bid to 1.828, and similarly she got Offer 2 increased to 1.825. She also got Offer 3 to change their terms to specify just 1 day to transfer the deposit. So now we had three comparable offers and were leaning towards giving it to the Google couple since we liked them. However, Susanna then sent us another update saying that Offer 3 had been increased to 1.85! Offer 3 was also giving us a month of rent back for free. So this was the best offer overall, especially since they had offered such a high amount to begin with, so we accepted that one. As much as we liked the Google couple, we were also concerned that the amount they would be paying for the down payment was nearly all of the amount in their proof of funds. It felt like they were getting emotionally tied up and probably bidding more than would be good for them long-term. Though it benefited us, I felt bad that Susanna got the buyers into a bidding war. I guess she was just doing her job and this is just how the market is, though. There's a reason why houses are going for this much in our area. And our area is still cheaper than Sunnyvale, Mountain View, Cupertino, etc.
At the end of the day on Thursday, after an agonizing wait, Susanna informed us that the buyers had taken a cashier's check to escrow and that we were now under contract. Whew! We're really blessed to have gotten such a high offer, and we're blessed that the process has been so smooth and that we have a shrewd agent who knows the market and knew what improvements to make to have our house appeal to today's buyers. We'd had doubts about whether anybody would want our house and whether it would even go for 1.6 or 1.7 million, so this has totally exceeded our expectations.
We're supposed to close escrow within 21 days, so we'll probably move around the end of June. We want to move down sooner so that we can start touring houses in SoCal. The hardest part is over and we're in the waiting period, but we've been trying to do small things like pull weeds so that the buyers don't think this place is terrible and get buyer's remorse when they move in.
We've also been spending more time with old friends from church. So far we've done dinner with Ryan and Steph (they bought us El Pollo Loco), dinner with Uncle Kenway and Aunt Susan and their family, dinner at Google with Tracy, dinner with Ruth and Albert with Richard and Michelle joining, dinner with Jerry and Vivian (she's an amazing cook), and brunch today with Tim and Irene. Coming up, we have dinner plans with James and Charlotte, a going away party with people from previous Family Fellowship groups organized by Emily, a going away get-together with the people on our worship team, a Korean BBQ meal with Jeff and Eleanor since we won their service auction, and a meal with Jean and Brion that we'll have to coordinate when they get back from traveling. Plus probably a final hangout with Tracy and my uncles and aunts, respectively. It's too bad that we're only spending time with people now that we're leaving. When we're in a new place, we need to be more intentional about meeting with others and cultivating relationships.
For now, we're enjoying a little bit of respite and a slower (but more intentional) pace of life. Priscilla and I did our annual hike at Mission Peak yesterday, followed by dinner at an old favorite, Layang Layang in Milpitas. I ran at Rancho with Yang last Saturday, and I trained at the park today and last Saturday with Joe and Wilson; we have our Monterey Spartan 5k coming up next weekend. We're learning to make the most of our time as our time in the Bay Area is rapidly coming to an end.