In this video, we’re going to walk through what happens as a seller when you get multiple offers.
What Does Multiple Offers Mean?
Multiple offers means the home that you’re currently selling had multiple buyers submit offers in a relatively similar period of time.
When they submit their offer, the offer is going to have an expiration time on it. This is the date and time when the offer technically becomes void. It’s invalid.
You need to be aware of this as a seller because you’ve only got so much time to respond back to this offer before it technically expires.
With that being said, as a seller, it’s in your best interest to try to wait until closer to that expiration time before responding because you want to give other buyers a chance to come through and see the property and maybe get multiple offers.
In the event that you do get multiple offers, your real estate agent (ME) is going to present all the offers to you. And if one clearly stands out, you do have the right to go ahead and accept that offer.
Now, in most cases the seller is going to want their real estate agent to respond back to all of the offers and let everybody know that they’ve received multiple offers. Then you’ll work with your realtor to set a new date, such as the next day by 12 p.m., that all highest and best offers are due by.
This gives all the current buyers and all the current showings that you might have scheduled, a chance to still see the property and still give everyone else a chance to offer on the property too.
The people that already have offered on the property, they now have a chance to revise their offer and make any changes that they wish to try to further entice their offer and make it stronger so that the seller might choose it.
At this point, the seller is going to kind of just sit back and wait and see if any additional offers come in prior to the hard deadline.
As a seller, you do have the right at any point in time to go ahead and take an offer early.
I’ve put this in the contract before for my seller clients, letting everyone else know that, “hey, the seller reserves the right to take an offer early if it’s a really strong offer.”
We may have a deadline of tomorrow, but I’ve had situations where sellers received offers that they couldn’t turn down and it didn’t make sense to them to wait any longer. So they went ahead and just took an offer right then and there.
But in most cases, it’s smart to wait until that final deadline so you can see all the offers in total.
Read Also: How Long Does It Take to Sell My Home?
With that being said, the next day arrives and the deadline arrives. Now you’ve got all these offers in hand, so as your real estate agent, I’m going to present them all to you, and walk you through each of the offers so you can understand how the offers differ, how they’re similar.
You can compare them apples to apples to make sure that you understand which offer is clearly the best offer to accept at this point.
Once we know which offer you want to accept, I am going to have you check an accept box that says you accept the offer, and then get your signature on the seller line of the contract.
I will then return it to that buyer, letting them know that you guys have an official deal and you’re now under contract to sell that property to that buyer.
Then I’m going to respond back to all the other offers, completing the rejection check box on their contracts, and letting them know, “Hey, sorry your offer was not accepted, but we thank you for coming through the property and submitting an offer.”
Multiple Offers are Great for Sellers
Multiple offers are a great scenario to have as a seller because it can create this bidding war where you go back to the buyers and you say, “Hey, we’ve got multiple offers. Please submit your highest and best offer by tomorrow at noon” or tomorrow at 5 p.m. or maybe in a couple of days.
You set the deadline by 5 p.m., for example, to try to give people a chance to submit a higher and better offer.
Again, this deadline helps create a bidding war where everybody goes back, revises their offer higher and now you might entice a higher offer to come above and beyond their the original offer.
A lot of times buyers start out with a lower offer to see if they can get a deal on the property.
But once they realize they’re in competition with other buyers, then they might raise their price, usually to a higher offer that they can compete against other buyers with in an attempt to win and get their offer selected by the seller.
In the event that as a seller, you only get one offer, you don’t have to accept that offer.
You can still leave your house for sale on the market longer and see if you get additional offers in the coming days and weeks over time.
You also have the option of countering back at a higher price, by sending that buyer a counter offer with the help of your real estate agents suggestions.
If you don’t think the buyer offered a high enough price, you can also just flat out reject the offer as well. That’s going to let them know that, “hey, you need to come around with a better offer next time.”
Deciding between choosing an offer or waiting for multiple offers, is a decision that depends on the quality of offers you’re receiving.
If you feel one is really good, you can go ahead and take it ahead of time. Or you can also always counter with your own offer back to the buyer of what you need to see the contract have.
So if you don’t think the current offer is quite good enough or there are some things that you want to change, you can have your real estate agent counter back where you make those changes in the contract.
For example, maybe price is okay, but you don’t like that they asked for something specific in the contract related to time frames or items staying with the property sale. You can counter back against that specific point of the contract and see if they agree with you by accepting your counter offer.
Overall, we will work together to make sure all the other terms of the contract also are good so that you get a full, complete offer that feels right for you.
Thanks for reading
Realtor Nick Foy
RE/MAX Oak Crest Realty Elkhart
Northern Indiana Real Estate Agent
574-387-2501
