From the Hernandez Files:
Three-bedroom, two-bath, 1,700 square feet, and built in 1900? It even had the palm tree in the front yard! No air-conditioning, but I knew what I was in for with a historical property. They wanted $629,000, which was ridiculous. I could wait a few weeks. They dropped the price in February to $599,900.

I saw it with my agent and decided to make an offer. Because it was very close to ideal (ideal would have been a two-story) we swallowed and decided to bid $505K, about $10,000 more than we planned. (I sold my home near Palm Springs for a six-figure profit in late 2006/early 2007, so I’m not as well-paid as you think.) I also had one contingency  — I wanted the historic photo of the house on display in the dining room.

The sellers thought I was lowballing. So they hedged and offered $579,900 and refused to give the original photo or frame. I took that as they were not willing to work with us, so with my agent we decided to step back. (Imagine killing a sale for a stupid photo of a house you are selling?!?)  In came a couple with an offer contingent on selling their home.

Three months later we get a call from the agent asking if we wanted to make another offer. The couple with the home to sell were redoing the bid without the contingency and I was asked to, “Make your absolute best offer!” It seemed fishy, as if we were being played against the other couple and we would already be in second position.  We refused to play. The house went into escrow.

According to the agent, it closed escrow earlier this week. The price? $505,000.

All I thought was, “You could have sold that house six months earlier if you had taken our offer.”

Agent 3.0 said, “Well, you were the first offer on the table and at that time the Sellers obviously weren’t willing to acknowledge the fact that they were overpriced.”

Sigh. The search continues . . .