Let’s talk more about my two favorite topics this week:
- Be Bold and Forge Ahead, in spite of the distractions.
- Off-market sales.
If you are a potential home buyer or seller who is chuckling to yourself about my lame attempt to instill some hope into the marketplace, take a look at these.
All of these sales happened off-market, and none of them were listed by Compass agents. Reffkin is taking the heat these days, but off-market sales have been around for decades and there is a real chance that they will prevail as a popular choice for sellers.
Consider the pricing on these.
Because they aren’t on the open market, the buyers don’t have the usual test of the price: Are there other offers? It takes guts to pay all the money in this environment!
Almost $6,000,000 in Olivenhain? This isn’t Rancho Santa Fe, and it’s not even in the gated Wildflower Estates. Yet the buyer paid cash for the house (above) without a market test or obvious comps nearby. Gutsy!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The La Jolla home above was listed for $4,980,000 with one of the most successful La Jolla agents – but it didn’t sell. Being on the market between April and August of 2024 was a good test, so the only conclusion is that it wasn’t worth the $4,980,000 then. Yet a different agent takes the listing and finds a buyer who paid within 2% of the price that we know it wasn’t worth last year:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The house below was a standard 1972 all-original tract house in Olde Carlsbad when it listed for $1,400,000 last April. Kudos to the listing agent who got it bid up to $1,625,000! The buyer and their agent completed a nice renovation and less than a year later they sell it off-market for almost $1,000,000 more!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The sellers had been here for 40+ years and typically that means the house looked a lot like it did in 1977. The cash buyer was an LLC so it’s probably a flip and this is an area that can handle sales of $10,000,000 to $20,000,000 so I’m sure they know what they are doing. But they will need to add some square footage to get up to that level and the bigger views are across the street (the hill slopes up to right):
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The common denominators:
- All sold for retail, or retail-plus.
- Selling off-market was the first choice.
- Agents marked them ‘sold off-market’ with pride. A badge of honor!
Off-market sales are happening in EVERY brokerage, and they are SEXY! They are pitched to buyers as a way to avoid a bidding war and finally get what they want – they just have to pay the seller’s price!
Compass isn’t trying too hard to sell listings off-market. Our push is more about avoiding future lawsuits and retaining the control of where and when the listing gets advertised.
But this is an ideal environment for off-market sales to flourish. There’s too much noise and distractions in the regular market and making quiet deals off-market sounds attractive to both sellers and buyers. It might be an easier place for buyers to have the guts!
And then there is this – the tail trying to wag the dog. What are they going to do? Send in James Bond to crack our security code and monitor our Private Exclusives? Or NAR or MLS rats us out? (our PE listings are registered with them)
It will be something like this that breaks down the whole system once and for all:
P.S. – Last night the blog finally got fixed!
This is dated last month!
https://www.wsj.com/economy/housing/home-prices-selling-spring-c3373ef8?st=oiKssy&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
BEHIND THE NEWS: Samuelson clarified that it doesn’t necessarily matter how a listing has been billed — whether it’s an “office exclusive,” “private listing,” “delayed marketing exempt listing” or something else — if it has been publicly marketed at all to a select group instead of the whole consumer population via the MLS, Zillow will not publish the listing at all.
“The fact of the matter is this policy applies to any status,” Samuelson said. “It could be a ‘coming soon,’ it could be ‘delayed marketing,’ it could be an active listing. It doesn’t really matter if the brokerage takes a delayed marketing listing, but that listing is made available to the other brokers, brokerages, so that their buyers have fair access. If that delayed marketing listing is available, therefore, to Zillow and other portals, that’s fine. It’s the selective marketing of the property to a subset of the of the market, a handful of buyers, which then disadvantages all the other buyers in the market. That’s that’s the part we’re focused on.”