Close but no cigar

I ALMOST had a buyer a couple of weeks ago. I say 'almost' because the deal is 100% off. Here's what happened. Lillian, my broker, thought it best to take the house off the market for the winter...for two reasons: there would be no activity in those long cold months, and this way, we would look like a brand new listing when we re-posted. There's nothing more attractive to buyers than thinking they should pounce on something new. She deduced that the prime date to re-list was the few days before President's Day Weekend. People might be out East and looking. Of course I agreed. That Tuesday we went live and within a day we had interest from a broker that her clients wanted to book time that Saturday to see the place. We were planning an open house that day anyway so it all worked out. Come that morning these buyers, a couple, two "lovely ladies" as Lillian called them, looked around the house for almost AN HOUR. They seemed to really like it. Later that afternoon she ran into them at another open house on the edge of town. They expressed how much they still liked my home. "Well, you should really put in an offer quickly" she told them, being the savvy realtor she is. Her strategy worked. By that night they put in an offer! It was a little low--$2.2M--but it was way better than the very low offer I received last Fall. One other snag was that they wanted a financial contingency as they were wanting to finance one million of the price. I didn't love the contingency but it was within striking distance. Remember, my current listing price is $2.399M, deliberatly giving myself wiggle room when buyers want to hondle. My dream price is $2.3M. I countered at $2.340 with no financial contingency. They came back with $2.3, no contingency, plus they wanted me to throw in a long list of my furniture. I thought "What am I, Raymoor & Flanagan??" But whatever. I agreed to SOME pieces but not all of them, namely the kitchen island and dining room hutch, plus a few others. We went back and forth over which pieces but finally had a deal. All good. This was Monday. They decided that they wanted to come back out (they live in the city) the next day. OY...but ok. They came back and spent another hour in the place. I went to Harbor Market nearby for a coffee. Lillian texted me when the coast was clear. But it wasn't. When I drove up they were still out in the street kibitzing with their broker. I was forced to meet them and introduce myself. They were pleasant enough I guess. Very plain girls, one was British in her 40's the other younger in her 30's. Down vests, jeans, no makeup, stocky. You get the picture. Within a few seconds the younger one said "We're friends of Dorothy". Cue the strained laughter on my part. What am I supposed to say to that. Mercifully it was over in less than 5 minutes. We learned quickly that they had scheduled an instpection company for Thursday. Lillian felt this was all good momentum. Here's where I add a kooky anecdote. When they were perusing the house they noticed all the racoons I have around. The said, "It's a sign! We LOVE racoons!" They went to regale Lillian with a story of how they took in a family of baby racoons at a house of theirs in the past. They even showed her A PICTURE of one of them covered in baby racoons! You can't make this stuff up. I figured it had to be a good omen too, right?

The inspection happened and it went smoothly, just a few minor things I had to take care of. Friday I had a doctor's appointment in Riverhead. I thought we'd hear back regarding some kind of revised offer. There was no word that morning. Nothing at lunchtime either. It got to be 5 o'clock and still nothing. I called Lillian and she heard from their broker later that night that they were extremely busy that day and had yet to receive the termite report so at best we'd get it all wrapped up by Monday. In the meantime, I had lined up my attorney to draw up the contract of sale and get it to their guy. I had a very nervous weekend. I count on NOTHING til it's "ink of paper"..."until it's ink on paper it's all just talk" kept clanging in my brain. Sure enough, Lillian called me Monday night that the deal was off. I knew it. They offered up a cockamamie story that an apartment adjoining theirs in the city was coming on the market, the owner had died. This wasn't the time for them to buy a house in the Hamptons. Or so they said. I'll never know the truth. What I do know is that it was a gut punch. I was devastated. I SO wanted this long waiting nightmare to be over. Now we had to start all over again. So here I am a couple of weeks later. Nothing. We've had 3 open houses and it's a replay of last Fall. No lookers, no bookings for appointments, even my Zillow activity is at zero. UGH. I'm now coming to the slow, sad realization that this house is not going to sell in this market. Until the Fed lowers the interest rate, buyers at this price point won't budge. They need to finance but not at these high rates. Lillian tried to talk me in off the ledge..."It's way early still. After Easter more people will be looking", etc. I don't think so. And Scott is no help. He keeps saying "It'll happen, it'll happen, RELAX", which makes me even crazier. I don't think this story ends well. I'm going to give it to Easter weekend and then I'll have to take drastic measures. Let's see what develops. And just so you know, it's getting old being out this ledge...

First snow

We had the first snow at the house last week. It wasn't super heavy but it was enough to look pretty for a couple of days.

The curio cabinet

I spotted this glass case curio cabinet on the street last week. It was being thrown out and I nabbed it. I think it would look great painted, a perfect place to store fabric and supplies in the new sewing room in Connecticut. Stay tuned for the progress!

Winter Freeze

Well, it's now January and I had no offers on the house. Super depressing but I sort of saw it coming. With the holidays there was absulutely no action at the end of the year. On the suggestion of my broker Lillian, I've decided to put the sale on hold, a freeze if you will. That way in a couple of months, say end of February or beginning of March I can put it back on the market as a 'new' listing. I'm hoping that by then people will want to start thinking about a second home so that they can be in by Memorial Day. That's the hope anyway. I'm very stressed out that if nothing happens by mid April then drastic measures might be in order, like say, selling Dogwood. But let's see how things shake out. It's going to be a VERY long winter waiting this thing out...

How low can you go?

I got the first offer yet for the house in Sag Harbor over the weekend. It was low. VERY low. I currently have the place priced at $2.399M, lowered from the initial price of $2.795M at the outset. That's $400K lower.

A couple from the city has come to see the house THREE TIMES. The first time was at an open house. They stayed for 40 minutes. They then went to see the house for sale next door, Sue's house, and stayed for maybe 5 minutes. No surprise, it's an ugly house, a split ranch that has no 'Sag Harbor charm'. "Can we go back and look at the other house?" they said. So back they went for an additional 20 minutes to wander around. A week and a half later they made another appointment to see it on Black Friday. Again, they wandered about for quite a while. Lillian, my broker, said "I'm positive we will get a bid, a fair one". So the next morning we get the bid: just $2M. And here's the kicker, the wife is a broker working on her own behalf. I have to pay her two and half percent of the commission as well! So add ANOTHER $50K to the price. Not good. I thought about it all day and discussed with Scott. I decided not to counter. I wasn't going to honor such a comically low bid. FOUR HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS LESS? No way. Not gonna happen. If they really like the house then they can put a real offer on the table for me to react to. I heard back that they were "disappointed there wasn't a counter". Whatever. Come back when you really want to negotiate. I've put it out of my mind after I finish this post. I'm gonna assume it's over. Finis. Bye, Felicia.

Stumped

There was an annoying tree stump in the backyard that was really upsetting my view of the backyard. It wasn't a large stump but I consider them so white trashy looking. It had to go. So I brought my table saw from Sag Harbor last week to get the job done. You make sever cuts into the top of the stump and more perpendicular to those. This makes it easier to cut it down in layers with the reciprocating saw. It's not as easy as you'd think. Holding both saws is hard on the arms. It took several layers of cutting to get it down to (almost) ground level. But it was worth it. It now blends into the rock that it was near and will continue to detiriorate with age. Here are two BEFORE & AFTER shots of it.

Joist in time

One of the things (among many) was some problems in the basement crawlspace. There were several rotted wooden joists that had become damaged over the years from a low window moisture problem. There was also an apparent leak in a waste pipe. Once my contractor Richard was able to get in there and asses what was going on he found that the pipe was ok but that the joists really did need to be replaced. It wasn't cheap ($2600) but it was far cheaper than the credit I got from negotiating with the sellers after the house's inspection. They gave me a $5000 credit, so at least on this one I came out ahead. Here are pics of the new joists in place: