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Well, we're giving @TryHomie a go, we'll see what it's like. So far the sign up process was fairly clear, the real estate agent reached out within a day, they sent us a comparable property analysis, experience is good so far.
Just barely was reached out to by @TryHomie title agency via text, I totally forgot about the title stuff lol. Will get information, a friend of mind used a separate title agency so I might shop around. I'm too frugal lol
The homie title lady said she'd email me info. Let's see how fast she is after I've opted in.
Had our first call with the real estate agent this evening, also got information about title and quote. Process seems pretty clear so far, the agent was personable and seemed like she was being pretty real with her answers to our questions. Good experience so far.
Sent a message to our realtor with @TryHomie after hours last night to see what response would be like. She responded fast, I've heard feedback from others that they can be pretty unresponsive at times so I was grateful mine responded quickly.
Also, we were supposed to be contacted by the photographer to set up our appointment, but that hasn't happened yet (3 days in). I'm following up with our agent as well as support to see if we can get that scheduled today.
Turns out we had to sign the listing agreement first, which we hadn't done yet. Support got back to me pretty quick on that question.
Well shoot, ran into our first hiccup with @TryHomie, we checked out with the pricing as a $1,500 fee, this was the pricing page when we signed up and checked out with our order. But in the contract they upped the price to $2,000
They must've just upped their prices right when we signed up, because now visiting the page the fee shows $2,000
Good news! They did raise prices, just yesterday, which meant that we were able to squeeze in right before the price increase. Our agent said that we'll get the discount back to $1,500. So we're just waiting for the adjustments in the contract now.
New contract in and signed. Next stop, booking the photographer
Photographer booked for Monday, they reached out pretty quick after we got the agreement signed.
Photographer showed up on Monday, was timely, courteous, the appointment took about 45 minutes I think. Went smooth
We also compared Homie Title with Backman title (which was who a friend of mine used when they sold their house from Homie). Prices were pretty much even, so we chose to go with Homie title too keep it all together. Hopefully that will be a good choice.
Both were highly responsive and helpful too by the way, so the limited experience I had with both so far have been positive.
Pictures were supposed to be ready after about 24 hours, ours were ready at about 20 (8am the next day). They looked good! He did a 3D scan as well but we couldn't find those, I wonder if those only show up once it's listed.
So now we're ready! We're probably going to publish the listing late this afternoon, have a pair of days for tours and then an open house on Saturday to hopefully field some competition with the offers. It's been that way with our neighbors that have recently sold.
I've also had a couple of tickets with @TryHomie support, and they've been pretty responsive as well, so no complaints there.
We're up! LET'S GO! Tell all your realtor friends. https://platform.homie.com/home/436566?3d=true
Homie got the rest of the ads up this morning, now we wait.
First showing booked!
Second showing booked!
Third showing booked!
Fourth booked, crazy.
First offer is in, before any showings
5th showing booked
6th showing booked.
7th booked. All for today
8th showing booked
9th, 10th, and 11th booked. We also caught some people driving by when we were supposed to let others in.
We did make a mistake with some locks so one family didn't get in
Alright, it's been a crazy few days and it was too much for me to post real time so here's a catch up.
We had 25 showings over 3 days. We were essentially running in and out of our house non stop, was exhausting but worth it
We had the blind offer I mentioned, but they killed it the next day.
Had another offer come in the end of Friday from a Homie buyer, which was huge because you can save a ton there as well in commissions, although I learned homie buyers low ball you because they know you're saving on commissions.
We had one more come in Saturday afternoon, at which point we did a multiple offers notice. This offer was way above asking price, but an FHA loan which meant the offer value was essentially garbage because it'd be pulled down by the appraisal.
The homie offer updated theirs to make it a little better, so we took it last night. There was a small counter we had to send over that was just a clarification, and now we're waiting to hear back that they signed... The nerves are uncomfortable
UNDER CONTRACT.
45 minutes before the deadline, man my stomach was in knots.
Ok now that I can exhale, here's some additional notes. Our house is in a neighborhood that's been a stepping ground for first time home buyers. So most of the people coming in are buying their home for the first time.
This means, typically, buyer's don't have loads for their down payment, which is totally fine.
Where it gets a little interesting is when you start dealing with offers tho. So for example, the offer we ended up taking was $25k LESS than the best offer we were given. We're crazy right? Probably. But here's why we did it.
When buyers don't have loads of cash on hand, that means they are limited to what they can get with the loan. It's how it was when we bought this house. Banks don't want to loan more than the house is worth.
So when a house gets appraised and it's less that the offer, the offer is usually immediately adjusted down to the appraisal. So in essence, this fantastic offer we were given wouldn't be that great after the appraisal because there is no way our home will appraise for that high
On top of that, their offer was tied to a normal real estate agent. The offer we went with was from a @TryHomie buyer (we got so lucky with this), which means we don't have to pay the buyer agent commission.
Those are GUARANTEED savings, irrespective of how the appraisal comes in. I'm no gambler, so locking in what is more certain, especially in today's market, is the way I roll. They also offer way less in closing cost coverings, so basically the home would have to appraise
for super high JUST to break even. Highly unlikely, so we went with the Homie offer. For those that include God and prayer in these types of decisions, it was always the offer that felt the most right, after weighing all the information we had.
A few more updates. Inspection was Monday, appraisal yesterday (no word back on either) radon test is wrapping up today and we should pass that with flying colors since we have a system installed
WOW. Appraisal came back for $306 
We knew $320+ was a long shot, neighbors and stuff are coming in at $315. But to come in at $306 (when our house has far more upgrades than neighbors)... Talk about a Monday morning gut punch :(
We knew $320+ was a long shot, neighbors and stuff are coming in at $315. But to come in at $306 (when our house has far more upgrades than neighbors)... Talk about a Monday morning gut punch :(
Oh my goodness, he completely forgot an entire room from the house, decided that the bottom 1/3 of the house was below grade, and shorted us 100 sqft from our previous appraisal on top of that.
At the end of the day if I understand this right, it essentially means that the house we bought, which was ~1500 square feet, is now ~1,000 square feet.
Whoa, the picture of the basement the appraiser included in the report isn't even our house....
My goodness, finding the specifics of the differences, he cut of 1-2 feet off of every wall of our house, left off the basement room completely.
He also said there is a power easement on our property (the power lines are between 1-2 houses away from ours) and also said that we have no fence (our yard is fully fenced).
. @TryHomie you should give Amanda some extra resources to fight this appraisal, that would be awesome because we got mega short changed by our appraisal.
Looks like he also said we had an attached garage when our garage is actually built in...
Some additional stuff, he left off the Master bedroom somehow in his bedroom list. The appraiser just barely got his license... I'm wondering if we're his first appraisal.
So @TryHomie I guess this is where you get the awesome opportunity to back up the core value of "having our back". :) Really hoping you can deliver.
