Your initial offer price is highly personal and should take into account how much you want the home and what you can comfortably afford. Generally speaking, your first offer should be high enough to garner an acceptance or counteroffer, but still one you can comfortably afford. Your agent can work with you to help decide the right offer price.
Finding the right price for the seller
If your offer is too low, it typically won’t merit consideration from most sellers. Here are a few things to consider:
- Number of days on market: If the home has been listed for a long time, there are likely few competing buyers. This gives the buyer more room for negotiation on the price.
- Comps: Another great way to determine an offer price is to look at comps or recently sold homes in the area of comparable size, condition and age.
Finding the right price for your budget
Your home purchase is generally the biggest you make in your life, and you want to be careful about what you obligate yourself to. According to Credit.com, a healthy budget shouldn’t allocate more than 28% of a homeowner’s gross monthly to a mortgage payment.
To see what impact an increase in your offer will have on your monthly payments, run the numbers through an online mortgage calculator. It’s interesting to note that, on a 30-year mortgage for a $500,000 house financed at 4.51%, if you increase your offer by $10,000 it adds only $62 a month to your mortgage payment.