Making an offer and negotiating when buying property, with buyer's advocate Frank Valentic.

Transcript:

Tom  and Lauren - nice to meet you.

It's your first home you're looking for?   Yes, first home, it's very hard.

To buy our first home, I think would definitely be just the start of a new chapter, you know a new chapter in our lives.  

So given that unit auctions are such an unpredictable and nerve-wracking experience, if we wanted to put in an offer before auction to avoid all that, what would be the best way to go about it?

Don't ask the agent will they accept offers before auction, because every agent will say no it's going to auction.  Just do it.

The best way to do that is to put it on the contract and show that you're serious.  Put in an offer in writing.  Attach a cheque with it and make it a strong offer.  Make it an unconditional offer so it can't be subject to finance or to a building report, and that might be just enough to get you over the line.

It's been pretty frustrating so far.  Losing auctions at like 100 grand above our our budget. A lot of places are going for a lot more than the internet says, so what's the general rule?  

It's really doing your research and if you've got access to someone in real estate that can give you comparable sales.  If he prints off all the sales and it has every sale sold here.  There are some companies now that provide access to data so you can buy property data in the suburb.  Print off all the recent sales. Get in your car, put them in the gps and drive around and then try and work out a realistic price range.  

Come auction day, what are some tips or kind of advice can you give us -  give us a game plan.

Yeah well I've got lots of little tips. I always recommend clients have an uneven budget so instead of 500,000 which most people are going to cap at 500 or 450 or 480 on round numbers, end your budget 503 or 507.  That's a psychological thing that you get to that number first. I always try and get to the round numbers first. I would recommend putting in a very strong opening bid.  Wait for a lower bid.  So it might be 400 plus and then someone that goes at four and you know is calling for ten thousand dollar rises and I might go straight up to 470 with my next bid to show that you're serious.  

Yeah those tips really good actually.  Yes definitely.  Knowing how to bid. I think learning to put a strong bid first to try and blow other people out of the water.  Come auction day, I'm feeling a lot more confident. 

It's an exciting new chapter and I think that yeah this could be the place to start them.