Fabulous! You’ve found the perfect home! Let’s get the offer together.
Before we can put an offer in on a home, we need you to answer the below questions so we have all of the information we need to write up an offer. You can either email us the answers, text them to us, or fill out this quick form. (click here to fill out the form)
We need to know:
Full legal name: Please email us the full legal name of anyone who will be on the contract as well as their email address. The legal name has to match what is on their driver’s license and or passport. Everyone on the contract will need to show a driver’s license or passport at closing and the documents must match.
Initial offer price: What initial price do you want to offer for the home? I will email you comps to review and give you my opinion as to what the home is worth and what price i would recommend and why, but ultimately the offer price is entirely up to you.
Your walk away price: Don’t expect to pay your initial offer price unless you are submitting your highest and best offer immediately. It’s extremely rare for a seller to accept your initial offer without some negotiating. That’s why it’s called an initial offer. In addition to deciding what offer you want to put in to start, we would like you to decide the price that you may be willing to pay or your final price. Of course we want to get you the best price possible and we will not share this ‘walk away’ price with the sellers or their agent. Our goal is to have all the information to help guide you to the best contract possible.
Closing date: Typically closing takes place 30 – 60 days from contract acceptance (45 days is the average), but often we can close as quickly as 21 days for purchases with loans (check with your lender to make sure they can close that quickly) or as little as 14 days for cash closings. Closings can only take place Mon – Fri; they cannot take place on weekends or bank holidays when the banks are closed.
Sometimes you can ask for a later closing date (60 – 90 days) but it all depends on the seller’s needs, asking is no problem but don’t expect it to be granted. Therefore, if you want to move around July 1, plan on putting in offers May 10 – 15. While some local lenders can do closings faster (usually 21 days is the fastest a closing can be done with a mortgage), most lenders can’t close that fast and need 30 – 45 days. If you want or need to close faster than 30 days please let me know as we’ll need to direct you to particular lenders who are capable of closing quickly or ask if your lender can close that fast.
Before putting in an offer, please let us know your perfect closing date. Usually we cannot specify a specific time for the closing as that depends on when the title company is available. A Closing time won’t be assigned until 2-3 days before closing and closings can take 2-3 hours. If you cannot attend closing, we need to know that 2-3 weeks in advance so we can ask the lender to approve a Power of Attorney that will allow a family member or your attorney to sign the documents on your behalf.
Earnest money: How much earnest money are you comfortable putting down on this property? Typically, contracts in Colorado ask for 1% of the purchase price.
Down payment: For the contract, we need to know how much you’re going to put down for your down payment. Examples would be 3.5%, 5%, 10%, 20%, 30%, etc.
Home warranty: Do you want to ask the seller to provide a home warranty on the property? If the property doesn’t have multiple offers, we always recommend asking the seller to provide you with a one year home warranty. Depending on the type of property you’re buying, this usually costs the sellers between $500 – $800. Here’s more information on what a home warranty is .If the property has multiple offers then we don’t recommend asking for this.
Contingencies: Any other contingencies we need to be aware of? Do you need to sell your current home before you can buy this home?
Lastly, buyers sometimes want to know what happens if the contract is accepted and they have a change of heart or the inspection reveals a huge problem. Read here for information on getting out of a signed contract.
Once you’ve talked through the above, either email us the above answers, text them to us, or click here to fill out a form to submit them to us. We will then write the contract and have you sign it via a program called DocuSign. Click here to watch a video on signing documents electronically via DocuSign. We’ll then submit it to the seller’s agent. While negotiations sometimes go quickly, be prepared that it often takes 2-4 days to negotiate the purchase price and terms of the contract. Every seller is different and some people can make decisions quickly whereas others need time to think things through. Patience is the name of the game once an offer has been submitted as we don’t want to look too eager as it weakens our negotiating position!