Sean
- Feb 19, 2022
- 4 min read

The Struggles of Buying a Home in 2022 - And How to WIN!

Updated: Mar 10, 2022

2022 is already gearing up to be a crazy year. We believe that it's still a great time to buy/sell. We're noticing a large disparity gap between the buyers who achieve their goals - and those who fall short. In this blog, we're going to do our best to show you how to end up with the keys to your dream home.

Instead of viewing it as winners vs losers, we're labeling it as follows:

The Prepared

Buyers who take required steps and plans to achieve their goals of home ownership.

The Unprepared

Buyers who run into the market unprepared and uninformed, and expect some poor agent to magically make something happen.

Not fun and exhausting.

What Are The Steps to Success?

Step 1: Meet with Sean and Blanca to review the buying process.

During this meeting you'll learn the home buying process and learn all of the strategies to help you WIN!

How important do you think this step is? Like Gandalf VS The Balrog important!

Step 2. Get fully qualified with a good lender [Not with an XYZ online lender]

Review your loan estimate
Which program will you use? (FHA, Conventional, VA)
Understand your downpayment
Understand your closing costs
Have your credit and finances in order
We have great lenders - just ask

Step 3. Have clear goals:

Where do you want to live?
Your budget?
What's your timeline?
How flexible can you be?
How aggressive will you be?
How bad do you want this?

Step 4. Have an Aggressive Mindset

Can we be honest?

If your fear of overpaying is greater than your desire to own a home, this isn't the time for you to buy. We're here to give you all of the market knowledge, strategies and tools to win (and not overpay).

In the next section, you'll see how some of our buyers had to be aggressive to win in multiple offer situations.

How crazy is the market?

We'll show you the offers that have won since 2020.

Solds since 2020

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Download PDF • 3.90MB

What are the winning strategies?

Listed below are some of the strategies that we use. Each purchase is different so we employ these strategies as needed and when needed. We'll cover these in detail when we meet with you.

We have been building strategies for 16 years in real estate. I don't expect you to understand each of these, but we wanted to show you that's it's not as simple as running out and seeing homes and making offers.

Get Ready - Get set - GO!

Strong Earnest Money Deposit

An average EM deposit is 1% of the sale price. Times have changed. The larger, the better, and sometimes we do a non-refundable earnest money. That's aggressive!

An Approval Letter from a Reputable Lender

The bank/lender that you choose matters A LOT. We advise not to use an obscure online lender.

What if I have a home to sell?

We have an amazing new program for this - Click on this link to learn about the Home Swap Program

Large Downpayment

What's large? As large as you can afford. 20% or more is ideal. People are selling assets, tapping 401k's, selling crypto, borrowing from family members, selling cars on and on.. What are you willing to do? We can help make a plan.

Flexible Closing Date

Knowing the seller's desired closing date is KEY? 🔑 We'll get all of the Intel fro you.

Buying with 100% Cash

If you can find a way to buy with cash, it will bring you to the top of the list. One of our buyers sold some Bitcoin and bought 100% cash. Smart guy!

The Home Swap Program also allows you to make offers as strong as cash.

Writing a Love Letter (or video) to the Seller

Yes, it works. Supposedly this is banned but we do it anyway!

The Offer Price

Choose an aggressive price that will have a good chance of winning.

But not so ridiculous that you end up overpaying. We got you covered!

NOT Asking for the seller to pay your closing costs

If you're up against multiple offers you want to avoid asking for closing costs. If there are no competing offers then we definitely ask for this.

Escalation Clause

Example - Buyer agrees to pay up to $3000 over the highest net offer up to $575,000.

Seller will provide pages 1,4 & 5 of the competing offer (buyers name redacted). Line 38 will reflect the new price if the escalation clause is in play.

Appraisal Gap/Insurance

Example - In the event that the appraisal comes in below the purchase price, the buyer agrees to pay above the appraised value, up to and no more than $15,000 to cover the difference.

Inspection Options: (we have a few strategies here)

Regular inspection
Soft inspection
Peekaboo inspection
No inspection

Tapping your 401k to help buy a home - Linked article from Investopedia.com

You can use 401(k) funds to buy a home, either by taking a loan from the account or by withdrawing money from the account.
A 401(k) loan is limited in size and must be repaid (with interest), but it does not incur income taxes or tax penalties.
While a 401(k) withdrawal is technically unlimited, it is generally limited to the amount of the contributions you made to the account and can avoid penalties if it is classified as a hardship withdrawal, but it will incur income taxes.
Withdrawals from Roth IRAs, and some other IRAs, are generally preferable to taking money from a 401(k).

RentBack

Like the name implies, rent-back agreements are legally binding agreements made in writing between the buyer and the seller. Both parties need to decide on a couple of issues, namely how long the seller will need to stay in the house after closing and how much rent the seller will pay to be there.

Contingencies (less the better)

Financing Contingencies
Inspection Contingencies
Contingent on selling your home
Solution - We'll protect you by writing the contingencies that you need and eliminating ones that could hurt your offer.

Offering the Seller a Perk