So, Whatever Happened to the Buyer’s Market?

Our real estate agent was frantic. “Can you get over here in 15 minutes and sign some papers? I think I got your house for you.”

I gulped hard and nearly choked on my lunch. Our dream house in Cheviot Hills--only a signature away.

I raced out the door, broke all speed limits on the Santa Monica Freeway en route to the agent’s office, where my husband and I signed the papers and agreed to waive every contingency we’d sworn to uphold.

Yes, we would take a swing loan if our home didn’t sell in time. Yes, we wouldn’t ask them to repair the leaky garage roof. Yes, we understood they were not obligated to fix anything that turned up in inspection, and yes, we would pay $17,000 more than we had originally offered, even though our original offer was already about $80,000 more than we thought we could afford if our house sold for the price we hoped we’d get.

We’d put it on the market only three weeks before, and already we had four written offers.

It was nail-biting time. We had quit looking for houses around November because our agent, Sharon, (and everyone else’s agent, for that matter) had assured us that in a market like this, no one would take our offer seriously unless we had our house on the market.

To sell our home, we were told, it must be in immaculate condition or no one would even look twice at it. So, being the types to take realtors’ advice seriously, we had a new roof put on, painted the place inside and out, cleared out the clutter--including an extensive collection of miniature ceramic toilet seats (engraved with maxims such as “Rest Your Ash in Memphis, Tennessee”) that decorated our living room mantel.

The house looked so pretty that we almost changed our minds about selling it. But the moving fever was upon us--and besides, our two-bedroom, one-bath house was becoming too cramped for two cantankerous adults and a restless 4-year-old.

We had scouted around in Culver City, but few properties were on the market, and most were too small or not to our taste. Then we began poking around in Beverlywood and Cheviot Hills. Much more was on the market, but most properties, even after multiple reductions in price, were far beyond our means.

Then we saw it. It was truly love at first sight of this two-story gray home with the porch to catch the afternoon breezes and the windows glinting in the sunshine. It reminded me of my grandmother’s house. Childhood memories of old-fashioned decor and comfort came rushing back. This was our house. It was fated.

“It’s got to be at least $800,000,” said my husband, Jeff.

“Well, it wouldn’t hurt to go inside and check,” I said.

The price was $635,000, at least $100,000 more than we thought we could comfortably spend. But, then, in a market like this, maybe they’d take $550,000. It wouldn’t hurt to try.

Inside, the home was exactly what we wanted: old and comfortable, with a marble fireplace, an updated kitchen, big grassy back yard, a family room. The elementary school was a block away. Sam could walk to school without crossing any busy streets. I could almost watch him from the doorstep.

Home we went to ponder the mathematics and call upon Sharon’s wizardry to secure us this place. Together, we sat down and wrote an offer we hoped would persuade the sellers we were serious.

Our price was $580,000, with a contingency to sell our property within a month, but allowing them to accept other offers as long as they gave us 72 hours notice so that we could remove our condition.

Sadly, when Sharon went to present the offer, another agent was there doing the same for her client.

“I think it was lower,” Sharon assured us. “They seem to really want to sell to a family. I think they really liked you, but they’re nervous about your selling your house.”

Suddenly our dream house was becoming a fantasy. We might not get it. How could this be, in a buyer’s market? We’d been had!

Meanwhile, the offers started to come in on our house. We’d listed it for $425,000. About nine months previously, before the market took a nose dive, comparable houses in our neighborhood had been selling for $75,000 more. But our agent assured us this price would get us “a lot of action.”

It did. Within a week, we’d had four written offers ranging from $350,000 to $410,000. We were dealing with multiple offers and counteroffers on our house, as well as on the home we wanted.

We spent our waking and sleeping hours figuring out various payment schemes on easy-qualifying jumbo loans at prevailing interest rates, which seemed to increase minute by minute.

If we cleaned out our savings, didn’t purchase anything major, do any decorating, buy clothes or furniture, have any major medical bills or insurance payments, go on vacation or lose our jobs, we might be able to make the payments.

Was it worth it? Did we love the house that much? The other bidder seemed to want it as much as we did. How much would we have to bid to get the house?

We visited the house again. Suddenly it didn’t look as great. There was no real dining room. Some of the paint was cracked. The furnace looked old. But . . . we still wanted it. We had to have it.

It was the kind of fever-pitched bidding war that used to happen before The Big Fall in real estate prices. It was the type of buying panic that probably made prices soar in the first place. It wasn’t supposed to happen to us. But it did.

Bitten by this born-again house-buying bug, we said yes, yes and again YES to all the conditions.

But, no, no, NO. We didn’t get the place. They liked the other guys better. They didn’t have a house to sell. They had more money.

The next day we sold our house for $410,000, just three weeks after putting it on the market. We’d thought we’d have at least three months to get used to the idea of selling the home we had lived in for seven years.

So now we’re trying to find another dream house and cope with this startling turn of events.

Whatever happened to the down market? It seems to have turned around, at least in our neighborhood.