I wrote a haiku today, after I heard back about my offer from last night.
Fear of new agent
Make mistake on first contract
Refrigerator
As predicted, we did not have the highest and best offer. We were somewhere in the middle of the pack. And to put that in perspective, it was a pack of twenty-two other potential buyers. Yeah, the market is like that here. All those national news articles about how tight the inventory is throughout Colorado, and how brutal the competition is to find a place, they are all correct. And they're probably understating the problem. In this size of house, of any age, in a price range extending fifty grand on either side of this list price, anywhere in the city limits where we were, last weekend there were exactly six houses available. Chances are, every one of those places has had multiple offers since I held the open house on the one we offered for. I shudder to think how long it's going to be like this. I hope construction workers are very busy this year.
I barely slept a wink last night. Part of it was because I sucked down a giant vanilla latte on the way back from the office, so that I could stay up long enough to complete the contract and get through the electronic signature and submission phases. But after it was done, I spent the next twelve to fifteen hours worried that I made a huge mistake somewhere in the contract, in such a way that it would have screwed over my buyers if we had won. I don't have a specific line item in mind. I was just vaguely panicky because this was my first offer, and I didn't have my mentor pointing at every single box I needed to check. In real estate agent parlance, a mistake on my part that would cost my buyer money is called "buying a refrigerator." What this means is that if I made the mistake, that money would not be coming from my buyer's pocket, it would come from mine (and more importantly, in that case it should). It could be a matter of forgetting to ask for an appliance that is supposed to convey with the property, or by mistakenly suggesting that my buyers would choose the title company and thus have the responsibility to pay for it. I was so scared that I'd win the bid, have an error I didn't know about, and end up owing money on my first commission check rather than having anything to take home.
Now I need to review how I did on that offer, once my boss has some time to talk it over. My buyers are still interested in getting some more property when something else comes open. They were beautiful people who knew full well that it was my first time through, but I want to be a seasoned pro for them the next time we do this. They deserve my best work. (Don't tell, but I want to be able to give my best to ALL of my future clients too.) I'm so glad to have had this experience, finally.
Can you tell in this photo that the Mister moved something like eighty raspberry canes to their new home on the back fence? While I was stressing over a contract, he was working himself senseless with a shovel. I got the better side of that deal.
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