How does the house selling process work with a cash buyer?

We get asked all the time how the house selling process works for a cash house buyer like us? While we can’t speak for everyone we can explain we buy houses. So we don’t waste your time inspecting the property we will give you what we call a “ball park” offer on your house over the phone once we have spoken to you about the condition and done some desk research. This way we make sure that out offer is in the ballpark of what you are looking to get before we come out and see the property. Our “ball park offers” are generally really close unless there is some major factor that wasn’t disclosed over the telephone.

If we are in the same ball park then come out and inspect the property so we can calculate a firm cash offer on your house. If the firm offer works for you we both sign a purchase agreement and open escrow with the title company. If you are looking to sell your house fast then we can close as soon as title is clear which can be as quick as 8 days but in general its around 2 to 3 weeks. We buy house in as is condition so you won’t need to clean or make repairs.

Watch the video of our founder Aussie Steve talking about the process during an inspection or read the transcript below.

Video Transcript

I’m here at a property that we’re looking to purchase. This is the first time we’re seeing it, and we’re doing our first inspections. We’re in Gentilly in New Orleans parish, and it’s a rainy day today. The seller reached out to us; she’s looking to sell the house in as is condition.

The house got some roof damage, and when it’s raining outside, it’s also raining inside. Also, the floors need to be replaced. There’s a bunch of work that needs to be done, so it’s just not ready to be sold to a realtor, so she was looking to sell it fast for cash to a cash buyer like us. We buy houses like this all the time, and we don’t use bank financings. We don’t need to pass inspections by the banks, pass appraisals and all that sort of stuff. We make our own decisions, and use our own cash so we can close fast and don’t have such issues stopping us from buying.

We like buying houses like this because we can add value to them. We have really good people that fix the houses, and we do a lot of them, so we can buy materials in bulk. We get good prices because our contractors get repeat work, so we can generally rehab a house much cheaper than the average homeowner could. So, we prefer to buy in this condition, and then we use our expertise and resources to fix it up and add value to the property. That’s really what we do.

As you can see, the house is a bit beat up. It definitely needs to be repainted and needs new floors as well. There’s roof damage here, so there is a need for a new roof, an update of the wardrobes, the bathroom and the kitchen. Houses like this, when they’re taking in water, the damage only gets worse. The value of the property just goes down over time as this water starts to really damage the floors and other stuff.

But this is what we do, so these are the sort of houses we like to buy. We would love to come in and renovate it. It’s a nice traditional shotgun property in Gentilly. It’s in a good area so it would make a great home. We might flip it for a new homeowner, or we could hold it as rentals. I like to come in, fix them, add value to it, put a tenant in place, and then we refinance out our cash. So, we buy for cash, put our cash and expertise into rehabbing it, and once we’ve added value, the bank will lend us money and then we pull that money out, and we buy the next one with it. We just repeat that cycle, and that’s probably one of our favorite strategies, but we do all sorts of things, and I haven’t made up my mind yet on this.

We haven’t contracted this one yet. Like I said earlier, this is the first time I am inspecting it. And that’s our process. We’ll generally talk over the phone, and based on the information that we get, we can give you a ballpark price. We’re generally pretty accurate if you give us the right information. We know how much the rehabs cost, so we generally give you a good idea, and if we’re in the same ballpark, which we are in this case, we’ll then come check out the house, and this is what I’m doing right now. Once we do this, I’ll go back to the office depending on when I look at it, it might be that day or by the next morning, then we have a firm written offer which you can take to the bank. Once we make that firm offer, we stand by it. We can generally close fast depending on the title, so if the title is all clean, we can close in eight days. We’ve done that a lot of times. But to be honest, on an average, it takes two weeks as there’s usually a few things to fix up, but definitely, we close within 30 days unless there’s some major succession problem which we can work through. We have really good title attorneys, and we are quite used to getting problem properties with some title issues, and we can definitely help solve those and work through them and our title attorney will do that.

So, guys, if you’re looking to sell a house, and it’s something like this that is not quite ready to be listed with a realtor then give us a call. We’d love to buy it. If it’s a nice beautiful pretty home go list it with a realtor that’s going to sell to a homeowner who uses bank financing. That’s going to get you top dollar, but if you’ve got a house like this that needs work, and you don’t want to do that work yourself, give us a call or check out our website, homebuyerlouisiana.com. We have a lot of information there about what we do. You’ll find a bunch of videos, and you will see testimonials from happy clients who sold to us. So, check it out. It’s a really good resource. You could just give us a call as well. We’re always happy to help.

Thanks so much guys.