Distressed Home Q&A Recording – September 18th, 2020

For your ease, we have provided a transcript of the Distressed Home Q&A Recording.

Hey, it’s Evan with Simple Sale Central Florida. We buy distressed homes throughout Central Florida, from Tampa to Orlando to Titusville.

We’re bringing you a Q&A. We typically do these every few weeks to answer any questions that we typically see from home sellers. As a distressed home buyer we see tons of questions because it’s kind of a topic that there isn’t a lot of good information about, so we like to bring you Q&As in which we openly talk about things that we see everyday.

And again, I’m Evan with Simple Sale Central Florida, and we will dive right into questions.

1. Is there anything I can do to get a higher offer on my home?

There’s always things you can do to get a higher offer. Very simple things would be just cleaning the property up. That’s going to bring a higher value, for example. If there’s a lot of junk or items like that, cleaning the outside of the property, the inside of the property, floors – replacing floors is a really easy thing that can make a big difference on the value of your property.

Other things could be updates, but that’s going to get a little more complicated, and a little more time consuming and hectic. But I would say the biggest one would really be just making it more appealing, in the sense of it’s just a cleaner property. That would be the fastest and easiest way.

If there’s a lot of junk around the property, that can be unappealing to home buyers that come and look at your property. It’s like anything else in life, if something is dirty, if there’s a lot of junk, it’s just less appealing to anyone that wants to buy it, even though it actually may not have a significant effect on on the house itself. You can make a big difference in what you’re going to be offered for your property.

2. I’m not sure if I’m ready to sell yet. Can I still talk about my options?

We have people all the time that just want to talk about thinking about it. You know, don’t know if I do want to sell or don’t want to sell. We will absolutely talk with you about your options and then make a recommendation.

Quite often we do tell people to not sell or maybe they should list their property because it’s not a good fit, they’re not actually a distressed property. Maybe there’s some very minor things wrong with the property that, in a sense, if you sell to someone that’s an investor or cash buyer, you’re going to get sell it for a significant discount and you’re really not going to get the most money out of it.

With that being said, yes you can absolutely call and we can talk through all your options and then make up a recommendation on what we think is your best option.

So yeah, feel free to call, 407-338-4183 is our number. You can go to our website, simplesalecentralflorida.com, and you can leave your information and we can give you a call. But with that being said, absolutely. We don’t charge to give advice on what we think is your best option because it’s not always us. We’re not always your best option.

In a lot of situations your best option may be not doing anything at all. You may be considering selling your distressed home and then it ends up that it’s probably not your best option and may be a better option just to keep it and rent it or, also list the property. Absolutely give us a call anytime and we will talk about your options.

3. Will I have to pay any fees for working with a distressed home buyer?

No, working with a distressed home buyer you typically do not pay any fees. Let’s say someone offers you $200,000 for your house. That’s typically what you’re going to get minus pro-rated property taxes you’re probably going to get around $200,000 minus whatever property taxes you may owe. Otherwise, if you’re being charged closing costs or anything of that nature, that’s very uncommon.

If an investor or cash buyer or home buyer is buying your property and they’re trying to charge you fees, that’s not typical and I would question the validity of that. You may be working with an unreputable company if they’re trying to add fees that you don’t understand because it’s very uncommon.

Like I was saying, typically what you get offered is what you’re going to get. If that’s not the case in your situation, then I would question that company and figure out “What are these fees that you are charging me? It doesn’t make sense. Why am I paying closing costs? Aren’t you supposed to be paying closing costs?” Those are the types of questions I would be asking.

4. Do you require any sort of contracts to work with you?

This kind of refers back to the question that we talked about earlier. As far as talking about your options, you don’t have to sign any sort of contracts. That advice is free, no obligation, just trying to give you value in a situation where your property may be distressed. We’ll give out information to try to help you and get the best result possible for you.

As far as working in the sense of purchasing your distressed home, yes, you’ll have to sign a contract. We’ll enter into a contract period. Typically, how a contract works is we’ll sign a contract and there will be anywhere from a 3-day to 14-day inspection period on the property, and during that inspection period we will evaluate the property and work to see if it is a good fit, and then close on the property after the inspection period, typically in less than 30 days.

So yes, you have to sign a contract in the sense to sell your home but as far as just talking about your options you do not have to sign a contract with us. You do have to sign a contract in order to sell your property.

5. Can I choose my closing date?

Yes, you can absolutely choose your closing date. We are very flexible on when you can close on your property. Typically it is going to be in less than 30 days. That seems to always be the case. People want to close relatively quickly and we work with the seller to choose a date that works with them.

You can be flexible, Monday through Friday. I would say in a lot of cases we close on Fridays but any time Monday through Friday in a period, any time of month is fine. So, yes you can actually choose your closing date.

There is another question that references this, but you can actually stay in your property anywhere from a couple days to a couple of weeks after closing to move your stuff out of the property. We typically allow anywhere from 2 to 14 days to give you time after closing to move out of the property.

You can have a closing and then remain in the property for a short period of time. All of that would be contractual, to make sure that you’re going to be vacating the property at some point after close, but there is a move out period available. People use it on occasion, it’s not used as often, but it does happen in certain situations and we are flexible working with you for that.

6. Do you buy homes outside of Central Florida?

We do consider them, and we look at them actually quite often. I would say that most of the properties are in Central Florida, but we would absolutely look at your property outside of Central Florida. Anywhere in the U.S. for that matter. We’ve done deals in several different states, it really just depends on the property, but we are definitely open to looking at your property anywhere but our focus right now is currently distressed homes in Central Florida.

7. Will I have to do any major cleaning or repairs before I move out?

No, you don’t; you really don’t. You really don’t have to clean the property or make any repairs. We’ve bought properties that have significant issues and tons of problems and it doesn’t really make a difference but referencing one of the questions earlier, cleaning or making those small repairs to your house is going to get you a higher value, without a doubt.

Taking the time to throw away junk or making small repairs like minor bathroom updates and things of that nature is going to make a difference. But do you have to do those things? No. You absolutely do not have to do those things.

We purchase distressed properties as-is with junk or excessive repairs, leaks, roof issues, electrical issues, anything of that nature we will definitely close on the property with no problem, so it really isn’t an issue.

8. What kind of legal issues do you deal with on homes you buy?

The typical legal issues would be probate. Probate is where the owner of the property has died and you are needing to go through the courts to determine that the property is now yours. This process can last anywhere from 3-6 months going through the courts. Other legal issues would be liens, judgments, things of that nature. Depending on the liens or judgments it can be a very short process or it could be a very long one.

We are currently dealing with one with code violations in Tampa that has taken several months, but you know, that’s what we do and we can always work through the issues, those legal issues, but honestly the most common is a probate. That’s what you see most, because it’s something that people don’t really talk about, but it’s also actually very common. Those are the types of things that we deal with.

9. Do you list properties on the market?

We do now list properties on the market. We didn’t up until a few months ago, but now we are currently listing properties. If someone brings us a property and we know without a doubt that our cash offer isn’t going to be competitive compared to what maybe a retail buyer would pay for the property, we do offer listing service in order to allow the client to get as much money as they can for the property.

At the end of the day our goal is to work in the interests of the client, and to do that in some scenarios listing the property makes more sense and they get more money for it and really, that’s our goal, is for someone to take a distressed property and get the most they can out of it and move on with their life. If that means listing the property and selling it to someone else we will absolutely do that. We will make that recommendation.

So yeah, Simple Sale Realty is now listing properties. I would say it’s not our first option. We would always rather buy the property, but in some situations if it doesn’t make sense for the client, we’re not going to recommend we buy the property if it isn’t the best choice for you.

10. What can I do if my property is worth less than my mortgage?

This is what would be called a short sale. You would negotiate with the bank on making an offer that’s less than the mortgage. Let’s say, for example, your house is worth $200,000 and you have a mortgage for $250,000, you would go to your bank and you would say “I have someone wanting to buy my property,” and we would help you with these negotiations as well, “I have someone wanting to buy my property for $200,000. I know I owe $250,000, is that adequate?”

You’ll have to get it approved by the bank on the short sale, and when you do get approved then you can sell the property for that amount, whatever that determined amount is. You can absolutely negotiate with the bank on your mortgage. It’s done more often than you would think and it’s really not an uncommon occurrence – it really isn’t. It’s done quite a bit and it’s a useful strategy for people in situations where for whatever reason. Maybe they bought they bought their property for a price that was too high and now they need to sell.

You can absolutely negotiate with the banks on your property, and get out of your distressed property situation. That is something that we always consider. With the short sale process it can take several months if not a year, so keep that in mind. It isn’t a short process in all scenarios it’s going to take 6 months or more. It’s totally possible you can sell the property that way, it’s just going to take some time.

I think that’s it for today. Are there any questions out there? I know I see a couple of people on here. If you have any questions at all feel free to ask, and also we’re always here to answer your questions. You can message us on Facebook, that’s a really easy way and you can catch us at simplesalecentralflorida.com.

You can send us your property’s address and your information and we will reach out to you and talk with you about your property, discuss what issues you’re having, and see if we’re a good fit for one another. If not, then that’s really not a problem. The goal of the company is to help the client out of their distressed home situation. If that means not working with us that is absolutely fine. We’re here to provide a service and that’s really the core of the company. If we’re not a good fit we’ll find a good fit for you, and it doesn’t always have to be us.

I guess if there aren’t any questions – I don’t see any questions, then that’s it. Like I said in the beginning, we purchase distressed properties throughout Central Florida from Tampa to Orlando, Titusville, Melbourne. Really from coast-to-coast in the Central Florida area we are actively buying properties.

If you have a distressed home that you are looking to sell or if you just have questions about distressed properties, give us a call at 407-338-4183. We also have an ebook on the site that you can download and there’s some good information in that. It’s a short, simple ebook that will tell you about distressed properties and help you with your distressed home situation.

But if that’s it then we will catch you next time. Feel free to reach out anytime. Thank you.