Reasons your offer wasn't accepted

Reasons your offer wasn't accepted

Your offer didn’t get accepted!? No problem, I’m sure you have done your best, but there are several reasons why your offer might not get accepted. Let us go through those reasons so that you can try to avoid them in the future.

First is your Pre-approval letter, this is the important part of the offer because they want to make sure you are able to get a mortgage.

As a realtor, when we are reviewing offers, we are asking ourselves questions like "have we ever heard of this lender?", "do they have a good reputation?" because you want a lender that has a good reputation in our area to make your offer stronger.

Second, ask yourself if you are being too unrealistic? Are your expectations reasonable? We get the craziest offers from buyers who are totally unrealistic in this market. We see two things about that – the buyer will often include a long list of contingencies in their offer. Contingencies means asking your sellers to do things on the front side.

The other day I've got one who has TEN different contingencies! So the seller passed, because they are looking for fast, easy and stress-free.

Another thing that we see a lot that is being too unrealistic is your time frame to answer the offer. You assume they can answer you as soon as you send the offer. (Like you want them to respond within two to three hours.) It makes you seem like a bully! I suggest giving them at least 24 hours because most people want to think about it. Remember - short time frames are not doing you any favors.

Another thing that we see why your offer might not get accepted is your buyer's agent. If your buyer's agent is a pain to work with, we probably already know that! That makes us tell the seller that " this agent is prone to disappear, they don't respond or there'll be a lot of drama". So how will you know this as a consumer? You probably experience it as you look at houses. Sometimes, it’s your buyer’s agent. So check those people out - interview them, make sure that who you're working with is someone who will work in your favor.

Sometimes it's the seller; they already know what they want—if you don't have what they want, they'll just pass on by. Sometimes you just have to tell yourself, “this wasn’t the house for me.” And move on to finding the right one. 

Hopefully, these tips will help you make more competitive offers in the future and if you're a real estate agent, maybe this will help you make stronger offers for your clients!

If you can think of any other reasons your offer wasn't accepted, feel free to share them in the comments below!