r/RealEstateAdvice

This person has been our realtor for a long time, has done many good deals with us , and is licensed in the state where we’re selling and in the state we want to buy in. They are not our close friend and do not socialize with us. However, they always share how they love us and how they consider us family and asked me for a large amount of cash tonight while crying in tears on the phone about a divorce to help them over a tight spot. They have already listed our house. Would you keep this realtor or start shopping for someone else? My wife and I are a little concerned.

There’s no such thing as the “perfect time” to buy a house.

People wait for it anyway.

The big idea is this:

The market doesn’t line up with your life. Waiting for both to be perfect usually means doing nothing.

Most buyers I talk to are waiting on one thing. Lower rates. Lower prices. Less competition.

The problem is those things don’t happen at the same time.

When rates drop, more buyers jump in. Prices go up. Competition gets worse.

When prices soften, it’s usually because rates are higher or uncertainty is up. So your monthly payment doesn’t really get better.

I saw this a lot the past couple years. Buyers waited for rates to fall. When they finally dipped a bit, showings exploded and multiple offers came back overnight.

Same house. More competition.

On the flip side, some buyers jumped in when things felt “bad.” Fewer people were looking. They had room to negotiate. It was calmer.

Here’s the simple way to think about it:

• Buy when your job and income are stable

• Buy when the payment makes sense for you

• Don’t try to time rates and prices perfectly

• Expect trade-offs no matter when you buy

The people who do best aren’t the ones who time it perfectly.

They’re the ones who are ready and act when an opportunity shows up.

I purchased a 1500 sqft townhome for 480k with 6% apr at the end of 2024. I have had buyer’s remorse almost since the day I purchased the place due to its location.

My fiance and I are looking to possibly move early 2027. I am not sure if I’m emotionally ready to buy another place and take a chance on location, which is why the idea of renting an apartment (for cheaper) for a couple years popped in our minds.

I think I might be able to break even on my place recouping my initial down payment.

Is this idea delusional? Most of my family thinks it’s a bad idea and I should just buy another place.

I’ve noticed a lot of people lately immediately see high HOA dues and assume that’s why a property isn’t selling. It can absolutely be part of the reason, but if other properties with similar HOA fees are selling, then that usually is not the real issue. You need to look at the HOA financials.

A lot of people ask how I even get HOA financials. The annoying answer is that most of the time they’re in the MLS disclosures. If they are not, you usually have to ask the listing agent, and unfortunately some can be very difficult or slow when it comes to sending everything over.

Now to the actual documents.

The first thing I look at is reserves. Skip everything else at the start. What percent funded are they at? 70%+ is solid. 30%-70% percent is a bit sketchy. Under 30% and you should pretty much expect special assessments or higher dues in the near future.

Next is the budget. As we all know, insurance has gone up a lot in California, so if you see jumps there that is perfectly normal. But if the budget is getting squeezed elsewhere to make up for it, that is a problem. You also want to see whether the HOA is actually maintaining the property properly or just trying to keep dues artificially low.

Now delinquency rate. If a chunk of owners are not paying, lenders can walk. That can shrink the buyer pool fast and create even more issues for resale.

Special assessments are another big one. Not just current ones, but hints in the meeting minutes too. A lot of people overlook the meetings, but they can tell you a lot. They often hint at future costs and also give you a pretty good sense of whether the HOA is competent or a total mess.

Litigation matters too. If there is active litigation, that can kill financing and drain reserves quickly.

Bottom line, high HOA fees do not automatically mean that is why the property is not selling, and low HOA fees can absolutely be a red flag too. Always check the HOA docs yourself and actually go through them properly.

I’ll also post some step by step examples of what to look for in real HOA documents.

We have been looking around, not seriously shopping for our new home. We found one we liked, got a realtor, it didn’t work out, but we were ok with that, because it almost didn’t feel right.

We stumbled across the most perfect home for our family, exact location, exactly what we wanted in a home, it’s seriously the most perfect house for us. The only thing that’s confusing is the home is listed for a price.

We put in an offer, what they were asking + closing. The seller hasn’t accepted. His realtor stated that they’re hesitant because our home isn’t on the market. When we put in the offer, we added the kick out clause and everything.

What we know about this home, it’s been listed 19 days, only had one offer that was denied. Not many showings. The home is in a family trust.

Our home will be on the coming soon MLS websites, we have pictures scheduled for Tuesday.

How can we convince this home owner to accept our offer?

How much percentage does orchard usually offer on a cash offer ok your house? TIA

I'm struggling hard with a sell vs rent decision and am hoping to get some advice. I have a friend in real estate that is strongly advising me to keep the property, but I'm struggling with the math of it making sense.

Home Value $850k

Outstanding Mortgage 300k, (2.4k monthly payment, 2.5% interest, about 14 years left)

Rent after property manager fee: $2950

After taxes I just about break even. I don't currently need the equity for anything, but will probably want to access it (maybe through a HELOC?) at some point for a new primary residence.

I've rented it for two years so far after it being my primary residence. I do like the idea of diversifying long term invests - so having property and 401k etc, but I have such a hard time with all the equity sitting there doing nothing.

Any advice, long term math help, would be super appreciated! Thank you!

I’m trying to understand the timing of inspections a bit better.

Do most people wait until their offer is accepted, or is it something you plan for earlier when budgeting and deciding what to offer?

Just trying to avoid making a mistake early on.

I need to vent to people who will actually understand this because my friends outside of real estate just don't get how much our online reputation controls everything.

I've been licensed for 9 years. Exposed to over $40M in transactions last year. I grind. I show up for my clients. I answer my phone at 10pm. I drive 45 minutes to open a door for a showing on a Sunday morning. I do everything right.

Three months ago I got a call from a referral. Luxury listing. Couple relocating out of state. Beautiful home in a gated community. Easy $1.2M listing that I had basically locked up over the phone. The wife loved me. We had instant rapport. She said her friend couldn't stop raving about how I handled her sale last year. It was mine to lose.

Then she said "I just want to do my due diligence, I'm going to look you up tonight and we'll get the paperwork going tomorrow morning."

Tomorrow morning came and she didn't call. I followed up around noon. She was polite but distant. Said they decided to go with another agent.

I asked what changed. She hesitated and then said "honestly we saw some things online that concerned us."

I knew immediately.

I had a 4.1 rating on Google. Should have been a 4.8 or higher based on my actual clients. But over the past year I picked up three fake reviews that destroyed me. One was from a buyer's agent on the other side of a deal who was upset the negotiation didn't go their way. One was from someone I have zero record of ever speaking with let alone working with. And one was from a former lead who I had a 5 minute phone call with two years ago and never heard from again but they left a one star saying I "ghosted" them.

Three reviews. That's all it took. A $1.2M listing walked out the door because a stranger Googled me and saw 3 stars mixed in with my real reviews.

I had tried everything before this happened. I flagged them through Google. Nothing. I responded professionally to each one. Didn't matter. I reported them through GBP support. Got the same copy paste response about how the reviews don't violate their policies. I even hired a marketing company that said they could help and they basically just told me to collect more positive reviews to push the negatives down. Cool thanks for that groundbreaking advice.

After losing that listing I became obsessed with solving this. I spent weeks researching how Google's review policies actually work. What qualifies as a policy violation. What the actual removal process looks like beyond just clicking the flag button. And I learned that most of the reviews destroying my rating were absolutely removable under Google's own published guidelines. I just didn't know how to properly escalate them.

Long story short I found a company that specializes specifically in removing Google reviews that violate policies. Fake reviews, reviews from non customers, reviews with no actual transaction, competitor attacks, all of it. They operate on a pay after removal model so I didn't owe anything unless the reviews actually came down.

All three were removed within a week. My rating jumped to 4.8 overnight.

Here's what happened in the 60 days since:

My inbound leads from Google increased noticeably. People searching "realtor near me" or "best real estate agent in [my city]" are actually clicking on my profile now instead of scrolling past.

I've had two new clients specifically mention my reviews during our first conversation. One said "I almost called someone else but your reviews really stood out." If she had seen me at 4.1 she would have called someone else. Guaranteed.

I closed on a $680K listing last month from a cold Google lead. That lead would not have existed three months ago.

The referral pipeline even improved because when someone gets referred to me the first thing they do is Google my name. Before they were seeing 4.1 stars and second guessing the referral. Now they see 4.8 and it confirms what they were already told about me.

I am telling you this because I know there are agents in here right now who are in the exact same position I was. You're doing great work. Your actual clients love you. But your Google rating tells a different story because of a handful of reviews from people who were never even your clients or from someone with a grudge.

And you're thinking "it's just a few bad reviews it doesn't really matter." It does. It cost me a $1.2M listing. It's probably costing you deals right now that you don't even know about because those people never called you in the first place. They just Googled you, saw your rating, and called the next agent.

The worst part about real estate specifically is that the volume of transactions is low compared to a restaurant or a dentist. A dentist might get 200 reviews a year. We might get 10 to 15 if we're actively asking. So one or two bad ones tank our entire average in a way that just doesn't happen in other industries. We don't have the volume to dilute them naturally.

Here's what I'd tell any agent reading this right now. Go look at your Google reviews tonight. Read every single negative one. Ask yourself these questions:

Was this person actually my client? Did we have an actual transaction? Did they have a genuine experience with my services? Or is this someone with a grudge, a competing agent, a lead that went nowhere, or a completely fake review?

If any of your negative reviews fall into those categories they are likely violating Google's policies and they can be removed. Not buried. Not pushed down. Actually removed permanently.

I wish someone had told me this two years ago before those reviews sat on my profile long enough to cost me real money. A $1.2M listing at even a conservative commission structure is a massive hit. And that's just the one I know about. Who knows how many leads looked me up and quietly chose someone else.

Your Google rating is your first impression now. Before your website, before your social media, before your headshot, before your bio. When someone Googles your name that star rating is the very first thing they see. Make sure it actually reflects who you are as an agent.

Happy to answer any questions about the process if anyone is curious.

Real estate investors/agents/realtors could ensure they never miss opportunities and get to deals before other buyers

I’ve been working with a real estate investor based in LA, who needed custom software for his business and we ended up building this for him and his team

The major problem

• Deals were getting missed (since most opportunities were coming from multiple platforms and no one could monitor everything in real time)
• A majority of the team’s time was lost in manually checking Facebook groups, Zillow, Craigslist and other websites or finding deals too late when multiple investors had already reached out

So, after a lot of brainstorming, here’s what I worked upon and you can implement the same in your real estate business too

• We built a system that monitors 30+ Facebook groups, Zillow, Craigslist and multiple other real estate websites continuously
• As soon as a new listing appears anywhere online, the system instantly detects it and analyzes it based on filters like price, location, property type etc.,
• We use county level assessors that directly pull all of the details of that property.
• Then, using this system we immediately notify the investor or their agents so they can reach out instantly and get ahead of everyone else
• If needed, different agents can track different types of listings so the entire team covers more opportunities at the same time without overlap

What this did:

Earlier, most deals were being found hours after they were posted and by that time multiple investors had already contacted the seller

The team was also spending several hours every day just checking platforms manually

With this system, they started seeing new listings almost the moment they went live and were consistently among the first to respond

This gave them a strong advantage especially for off market deals and underpriced properties that move quickly

Hence, instead of missing deals or coming in late, they are now getting early access to most opportunities which made a major difference

Hope this helps you guys! Happy to share more details if needed 👍

might get downvoted for this, but after observing a lot of buyers recently…

It feels like most people aren’t actually buying a home, they’re buying pressure.

Pressure from:

• Family (“renting is wasting money”)
• Society (“own house = success”)
• Builders (“last few units left”)
• Friends who have already bought

And in that rush, people ignore things that actually matter:

• Overpaying for average locations
• Taking loans that stretch finances for 20+ years
• Ignoring hidden costs and legal checks
• Trusting marketing more than reality

What surprises me is that many people know this… but still go ahead.

Maybe because owning a home feels like a milestone you can’t delay.

I’m not saying buying is wrong, but I honestly feel a lot of decisions today are driven more by emotion than logic.

I am kind of confused. I did pay a good chunk of my principal (remaining 310 on the value of a 800k home). Was a 15 yr mortgage. But now I want to get out for personal reasons as well as feeling the need to upgrade by a little. Any idea why people say that we shouldn’t move out until 7yr mark. I am on 5th year with my current home.