Dave Roberts

Jeanne correctly indicated that you are succeeding in identifying the bargains in your market. Not every home gets multiple offers, so you are choosing homes that other buyers agree are good deals. Shel-lee also made a great point about having a strong cover letter stressing why your offer, especially with all cash, should be the one the seller accepts. She also made a strong case for relying on your real estate agent to help with assessing the fair market value.

One aspect of your search that I would want to review with your agent is why you aren't seeing these listings before there are multiple offers. If you are new to the area I can see why it would take some time to review the inventory of homes in your price range. On the other hand, you sound like you have been doing this long enough to have lost some offers. If you have seen most of what is out there, you should be spending your time looking at the nearly half a dozen REO homes coming on the market every day. Make your all-cash offer the first one the seller sees.

Finally, I know from Jeanne's answer that she has been through the multiple-offer wars before. Most experienced agents have been there as well. The only advice I can give you is to stick with it. My personal record is eight offers for one client before one got accepted, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear of ten or twenty offers before a successful escrow. You will get a house you like if you are persistent and have cash to offer.

The link below is to a blog post I wrote about the details of Sonoma County overbids in the REO market. It may have some information you can use. - Sun Jul 13 2008, 07:25

Heather, there's never an excuse for bad customer service. You should have gotten an acknowledgement that your offer was received by the seller's agent. On the other hand, Michael laid out in exquisite detail just how painful the process of dealing with REO properties and short sales has become. I just heard a report on NPR that agents around the country are waking up early, not to talk to the bank, but just to leave a message before the voice mail box fills up. These are strange times. The courtesy of an acknowledgement would have pleased you, but then two weeks of no news might have driven you crazy and neither agent would be in a position to help you. - Wed Jun 25 2008, 19:22

Hi Heather,
This was a great question that I thought about answering, but decided to do a little digging before I said something I couldn't document. I looked at all the REO listings that have sold since the first of the year. As of today, that's around 460 homes. In January it was unusual for a home to sell over the listing price. In fact, only one did during that month, and it went for 1% over asking. Two others sold for the listing price, and everything else was discounted. Fast forward to May, and the REO market is on fire.

The high mark that I see in all of 2008 was in May, and it was clearly a situation where the property was priced below the true value. It sold for 21% over the listing price. In this case, that was an astounding $67,000 overbid. Fortunately for the vast majority of buyers and agents in this market, that and a few other homes are the outliers. There are only 9 homes out of 460 that sold for more than $30,000 over listing price.
Here's the breakdown of the rest of the over-listing sales:
15 overbids in the $20,000 to $30,000 range
18 overbids from $11,000 to $19,999
12 overbids between $10,000 and $10,200 (next bid at $10,201 might win)

There's more detail that I'm going to talk about on my web site.

Dave - Mon Jun 9 2008, 16:35

The open house touring idea can work very well. Pam has made some excellent suggestions for initial places to visit from a climate point of view and Susan has already given you some good rental suggestions. If you make a checklist of things you think are important in a neighborhood you can keep running scorecards on each of the neighborhoods you visit. Street trees, yard and garden maintenance, house upkeep, proximity to transportation, shopping, parks, etc.
You may find an agent that you really like at an open house, and they could help understand the neighborhood they are working in. You would also do well with either Pam or Susan who have created histories on this site and are obviously both experienced and serious agents. They clearly also know how to use computers which matters a lot. Good luck. - Fri Jun 6 2008, 16:32

I think your candor is admirable. I'm sure other agents on this site will offer to help you with the short and long term needs you explained. The cycle of real estate sales tends to be a months or years long process in many cases. A six or nine month time frame while you get acclimated and start to identify your favorite neighborhoods is perfectly normal. The one thing most agents will agree on is that it is wonderful to find clients who are steadfast. Once you find an agent you enjoy spending time with who is doing good work assisting with your search you should stay with them. You'll get great service and they will get the satisfaction of helping you find a home and getting paid for time spent helping you when you find the home you want. Good luck. - Thu Jun 5 2008, 20:19

Carneros is cooler, foggier, and windier than many of the other appellations in the area, but Petaluma shares many of those characteristics. As a rule of thumb, the farther from the bay, ocean, and rivers you get, the warmer it's going to be. From the point of view of a residence, as opposed to a vineyard, these differences aren't going to matter very much. You'll probably need a lot less air conditioning than Sacramento or Cloverdale, and your barbecue parties are going to be cool in the evenings. - Thu Jun 5 2008, 07:20