Sellers, We Feel Your Pain

The Perfect Spot in West Hartford Center to Meditate - Let All the Silly Buyer Requests Just Melt Away...It’s good for Kyle and me to periodically do real estate deals of our own so that we have our clients’ perspectives fresh in mind. Our most recent deal was on the sell side and had its share of drama. Like every seller ever, we felt that the buyers were making unreasonable requests. Let’s count down our top three favorites:

3. Fix a Working Door. One of the post-inspection requests was to fix the bedroom door, which they claimed was not working properly. There were no specifics about what exactly was wrong with the door, so we were very curious to see what was up. Nothing was – it was working just fine. The buyer’s agent went back to the house to confirm that the door was in fact working properly.

2. Fix a Working Bathroom Fan. A less subjective issue that the buyer raised was the bathroom fan. Apparently it was not working during the home inspection. Neither Kyle nor I had ever seen the fan “not working” before or after the inspection, and we never received any complaints from our tenants, so we asked for clarification about the issue. The second explanation was that there was not enough suction. Since this particular request seemed like a dealbreaker for the buyer, we decided to just replace the fan.

And, drum roll please, our #1 favorite unreasonable request…

1. Fix the Mailbox Lock. First, the mailbox, and its lock, were not part of the home inspection. We did not provide a key to potential buyers because why would we want them checking our mail? Second, the mailbox is not even part of the condo, it’s the responsibility of the management company. It would have been fine if the buyer had just asked about the mailbox once and accepted our explanation. However, it came up again, and again, and again – very frustrating.

The questionable requests in this deal actually extended well beyond these three. After getting the full list of requests from the buyer after the inspection it seemed amazing to us that buyer was even still interested in the place. Fortunately for us, none of the issues were particularly expensive – they were more annoying than anything else. Especially since many were so different from what buyers we represent usually request. We generally recommend that buyers ask for major structural and safety issues to be addressed, while planning to take on the little things themselves as part of home ownership.

These are the kind of things that make sellers crazy. Kyle and I got a fresh reminder of the process and a healthy dose of insanity. Perhaps we got even more than our share since the nit-picky requests continued all the way until the closing. The buyer’s final attempt to extort from us was a request for $100 to replace a window blind that “didn’t work.” Grrrr!