The Secret To Negotiations For Fsbo Sellers
By Raynor James, Fri Dec 9th

When it comes to buying or selling a home, the idea of having tonegotiate can be intimidating. Most of us aren't aware we havenegotiating skills even though we skillfully negotiate daily.(Who walks the dog, takes the children to school, goes out topick up lunch, prepares the report, etc., etc.?) Let's debunksome myths about negotiating, shall we?

This Is Not Negotiable

Sellers often say to themselves, "This is the deal I'm willingto make. It's not negotiable." That's not necessarily becausethere is no room to negotiate. It is the simple result ofanxiety about negotiating.

Take



this approach and you may be chasing away otherwise goodpotential buyers. The buyer gets into a huff about the seller'sinflexibility and everything goes down hill from there. Thisneed not happen. Sellers should be willing to enter intoreasonable negotiations and just remember that they can say "no"at any point along the way toward working out a deal. However,they need to ask themselves when each subject comes up, "Am Iwilling to lose this deal over this point?"

The buyer needs to have a similar mindset. When seller and buyerare thinking along the lines outlined above, and eachacknowledges the possibility of working out a deal in which bothbuyer and seller come away feeling like winners, the stage isset for successful negotiations. It is fortunate that most folksdo think along these lines.

It's also helpful that buyers and sellers are not always focusedon the same things to the same degree. Price might be moreimportant to one, and the time of the sale's completion moreimportant to the other. Sometimes negotiations are just a matterof balancing things out.

Typical Pattern

Successful negotiations don't usually drag on for a long periodof time. There's usually an offer, and a counter-offer which isaccepted. Many times the first offer is actually accepted if itis the result of a conversation between buyer and seller wheresubtle negotiations took place. At most, successful negotiationsare usually concluded with an offer, a counter offer, and acounter-counter offer. It's usually a sign that the deal is notgoing to work out if negotiations continue much beyond that.

There are exceptions to everything, of course, and the minuet ofnegotiations can go on for quite some time where two people wholove to negotiate are involved. However, even in those cases,most of it tends to be verbal with the written sales contractchanged very few times.

The biggest point of this article is don't get intimidated. Ifyou stay objective, you will be able to get what you need fromyour home.

About the author:Raynor James is with http://www.fsboamerica.org - providing FSBOhomes For Sale By Owner. Visit our "sell my home" page athttp://www.fsboamerica.org/seller.cfm to list and sell your homefor free for one month. Visithttp://www.fsboamerica.org/buyer.cfm to see homes for sale byowner.

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