Buyer Beware

I was in the same boat and still closing on a Fannie Mae home.

"1. What is the time line from submitting an offer to receive an answer if an offer was accepted?"

For us it was between 2 to 4 days because don't know when Fannie Mae got the offer. There was another offer as well.

"2. What is the time line to close on a house once an offer has been accepted?"

It's supposed to 30 days in Georgia but I'm no pro in this business.

"3. I have been told to offer from 50% to 85% of the listed price. Is this accurate?"

Wow, our realtor told us 5-10% off on a well-maintained and clean house. We didn't buy an expensive house so the price couldn't drop much more especially when there were a lot of first time buyers looking for that $8K credit. We offered full list price and so did the other buyer but we won based on our VA loan. My uneducated guess is to reduce the price that much the house would have to be: grossly overpriced, a real fixer-upper or one desperate seller. - Mon Aug 24 2009, 06:43

I thought the original reason behind the credit was that their was a growing inventory of vacant foreclosed homes that were driving down the value of surrounding homes creating a cascade effect of decline on neighbors who may not have been irresponsible in paying their mortgage. The government couldn't buy and maintain all the empty homes when the failing banks couldn't. The cheaper solution was to add new first time buyers who had been unable to afford a home during the boom years. Extending the credit to all is far too expensive and pointless as it's just a house swap adding no one new. The effect will be the opposite and sellers up their prices artificially across the board to soak the credit money once again shutting out first time buyers.

I'm somewhat bias like most here. In my case, I bought a modest home for the credit and because I've got a kid on the way. Due to market changes I don't expect to make a profit when the real price of the home isn't what we paid but the total for a 15 year mortgage. I rarely hear buyers or sellers say that so I'm assuming they base the value of their home on original price paid+improvements+/-comp values. - Mon Aug 24 2009, 06:12

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Type Atlanta and you'll get Q&A for that area only. - Fri Aug 21 2009, 06:24