Too many times you may have been the victim of wanting to push the envelope for your client, the seller. An offer comes in $15,000 less than the asking price and you, based on years of experience, know darn well this buyer is coming up at least $5,000 to $10,000 more, right? Not so fast! You pride yourself in being the “master” negotiator, the “super” hero agent, the agent that just won’t give in to that aggressive buyer who wants to steal your seller’s property. We have all been there, we are all very protective of our seller and most of us think we understand the psyche of the buyer, even though we have never met them, or even spoke to them once. We base our advice that we give on the representation of the Buyer’s agent, who by the way, represents who – the buyer, not your seller. Well, this is a new day, a day of considerable (rebuilt) inventory, a day of faulting equity markets (The Dow Jones 30 Industrials plunged more than 300 points just the other day), major political turmoil abroad and the uncertainties of employment, causing continued mortgage delinquencies across the country. Folks, this so-called recovery makes for a very “Buyer” centric market, NOT a Seller’s market by a long shot! With millions of government dollars lining the streets of our local neighborhoods, the lowest of interest rates and the positive news we’ve been hearing, not seeing, should spell a MAJOR recovery. Homes should be sparse and sellers should be getting multiple offers ALL the time. We should not be decreasing prices, rather we should be increasing prices. In most towns locally and nationally, this is not the case. Grant you, there are plenty of great stories to share, but sustaining a pace of vertical incline, could potentially be a story of fiction and uncharacteristic in such an economy . My point is to encourage you not to play the game as it once was played, and really, really consider advising your client to take the offer that is staring them square in the face and not to counter, not to change the closing date, and not to falsely think that the buyer will be back – because in today’s market, they are sneaking out the back door and leaving us stuttering over the phone, explaining to our seller as to how we loss their only buyer. If that offer is close to what your client wants, close the deal. These buyers today are very different, very informed and very resourceful…Look out, they are smarter than all of us… In closing, we have experienced a wonderful year of sales and will continue within the company as a whole. We are an abnormality, where most companies

are reporting declining markets across the Merrimack Valley and Southern New Hampshire, we on the other hand have enjoyed an increase in sales, as well as price appreciation. But the need to understand the market, in order to advise our clients appropriately has never been as important as it is today. Reputations are destroyed by giving misinformation, uniformed encouragement and ill advice with regard to someone’s livelihood. We don’t want to be that person. Thanks for reading. Hope you all have a great weekend!…Your time is now! Good luck! – Blaise 🙂