This was in 2014, when I was barely a year into the industry. The housing market was very hot during this time, and I secured a listing in a prominent area. Along came a prospect who contacted me for a property viewing, and as usual, we arranged one. The prospect came with her sister-in-law and her son; it did not take that long for the viewing. After the viewing, she confirmed she was purchasing the property. Of course, I was excited, and I remember bringing the booking form to her sister-in-law’s house and waiting for her to prepare the booking payment.
It was evening, and it all went well that night—the booking deposit was paid, and the booking form was also signed.
Now, for the loan process: the prospect had her own banking officer to aid her with the loan, and she submitted all her documents. After a week, news came that her loan eligibility would be hard to get approved, as her income level was not meeting the minimum. We somehow waited for another week until we received the official news that her loan status was still pending, or maybe KIV.
I intervened. I engaged my top bankers from a few more other banks and asked them to do their best to get the loan secured. I remember, one bank reverted that the purchaser had a slim chance, but it might take some time—not sure how long, but some time.
I informed the vendor (the owner) and humbly requested a time extension. The vendor agreed; he was kind enough to wait and give this buyer a chance.
During that time, I met with the purchaser every other week to update the status of her loan progress, and she started to share her story—why she was buying this house and what her plan ahead was for her life. She shared her personal issues at this point. I just lent my ears to listen. I simply listened and did not comment on anything, as these were her private life issues. But one thing I need to highlight is that she was buying the property to go her separate ways with her spouse. She bad-mouthed her husband so much so that she needed to prove to herself that she could live without him and carry on her life. I’ll stop here; that’s what she said.
After a grueling two months, finally the loan was approved. But the battle was not yet won. What happened after this was that she secretly brought her husband and went to see the subject property from outside. It happened that her husband commented the house looked so old and needed much repair of this and that, and started demanding a lot more things. One request I remember was for the vendor to repaint the whole house.
All the demands came as a surprise to me, but it was obvious as the husband seemed to be in the picture now and wanted to have a say. So be it. The owner rejected all the demands.
I tried my best to explain to the original purchaser that this all was not agreed upon prior, and it was clearly stated that the property was on an “as-is, where-is” basis, and therefore the final price was reduced before confirmation. She avoided me from here on. I even tried to negotiate some of the unreasonable demands to make it work; she rejected it, claiming her husband now wanted all their requests to be met. Failing that, she would abort the deal. What?
I calmly informed her that at this stage—which was after the loan had been approved, and which the vendor had waited a good two months for—her deposit would be forfeited. I refreshed her memory by recalling the basic terms and conditions of the booking form she signed.
After all attempts to salvage the deal failed—now that she had gotten back with her husband and had changed her mind—I wrote her an official email stating the vendor’s request to forfeit the deposit and abort the deal, as he wanted to move on and sell the property to someone else.
#propertyagentlife #propertysubsale