We’re back to continue our series on our Brisbane case study purchase for one of our clients, Luke. We’ve reached the exciting part of the process as we discuss in this part 6 the details of the deal and making an offer.
Time to catch up if you haven’t on the previous posts leading to this part of the series:
Part 1 — Meeting the client
Part 2 — Setting Buying Criteria
Part 3 — Narrowing Down Locations
Part 4 — Brisbane Purchase Case Study Part 4—Location Down to Two
Part 5 — Zeroing in in North Lakes
The Property
After inspecting and analysing properties in Rothwell, Mango Hill and North Lakes, Luke has decided to choose North Lakes and this lovely ex-display house is his target property.
This 4-bedroom, 2-bathroom abode with double garage was built in 2004. It sits on a 429-sqm block, made of brick veneer with rendered finish, and is currently rented at $400/week on a periodic lease. This property is listed at offers over $389k.
Now if you will remember, part of Luke’s buying criteria is a budget of $350k. However, as we go through the process, Luke has decided to go $30k higher, making his budget set at $380k max. While we came across some potential properties within the $350k mark, we deemed to go for the properties within the next price bracket as they were a better option ‘round this area of North Lakes.
There are several factors that enticed us to this property—1) it is located in a more established part of North Lakes; 2) being an ex-display house, the finishes and features of the house set itself apart from the other properties we’ve inspected; and 3) the property is well-kept by current tenants (who wanted to stay).
‘Best Offer’ strategy
Initially listed at ‘Offers over $399,000”, this property had been on the market for approximately 3 months so the vendor decided to drop the price to offers over $389k. Clearly, this property was still beyond our budget so we decided initially to go for the ‘best offer’ strategy.
Instead of starting low and negotiating up, best offer strategy is when you put forward your best and final offer. The key is in determining (and sticking to -well, mostly) your best and final offer as you could end up missing out on a deal if you make an offer while that price isn’t really your best and final offer but it is taken as such.
So we put forward a $370k offer on this property, subject to satisfactory building and pest inspection within 14 days and subject to finance approval within 21 days. We got a counter offer of $385k. Still away from what we were eyeing on. We waited awhile before putting forward an offer of $374k. After discussions with the real estate agent, we then settled on a purchase price of $375k. Contracts signed!
So what happens between contract signing and settlement? A lot! Don’t miss out on the next part of this series!