5 Signs You Can Trust A Cash Offer For Your Home

Selling a Michigan house for cash isn’t the traditional or typical route, so naturally, people are concerned about the risks. After all, when you do a traditional home sale, you don’t have to vet the offers—the bank takes care of that for you. If the prospective buyer isn’t credible or has bad credit, the bank will simply deny them financing. But selling your house for cash isn’t an insane risk, it’s often your best option if you want to sell quickly. Here are 5 signs you can trust a company or individual making a cash offer for your home.

1. The cash offer makes sense

Everyone would love to double their money when they sell their house, but that just isn’t the reality most of the time, especially if the market has faced downturns, your home is in disrepair, or you need to sell very quickly. Given the condition and the appraised market value of your home or property, an offer that is in that ballpark is more likely to be legitimate.

2. The real estate investment firm is legitimate

There are a lot of shady real estate investment operations out there, scamming people out of their money. Make sure that the company you’re dealing with has a solid reputation in your community and in the industry. Look into their investors, their past projects, and their online presence and ratings to get a sense for their legitimacy.

3. The investment firm has glowing reviews and testimonials

People aren’t going to write good reviews of a company who nickel-ed-and-dimed them or otherwise took advantage of them in the sale of their house. So, if their reviews are stellar—and not just on their website, but on other platforms like Google, etc.—you can have more confidence that you’ll be well-treated, too. 

4. The real estate investment company is local

A local company is always your best option for selling for cash, as they can provide you with a better and more accurate appraisal of your home’s value, as they can send their personnel out to your home, rather than subcontracting the appraisal to a third party or not performing an in-person appraisal at all.

5. The offer is for the home as-is

If the company purchasing your house is asking you to make a bunch of changes and updates to the home before they come through with the price they offered, that might be a sign to step away. Renovating the home will take time and cost you money, during which time the deal could fall through. Legitimate real estate investors and purchasers will make you an offer for your home based on what it’s worth now, not what it would be worth if you replaced all the appliances and put in new countertops.

Signs You Shouldn’t Trust a Cash Offer

If you receive a cash offer for your house or property, here are a few signs to look out for that indicate that something fishy is going on:

• The investor doesn’t have a website.
• It’s difficult to get in touch with your point of contact
• The offer is extremely high or too good to be true
• The real estate investor only contacts you via email or digital means, or won’t meet in person 
• The investor has never appraised or inspected the house

If you’re looking for a cash offer for your home that you can trust, call Hometown Development. We’re a local real estate investment firm with a mission to responsibly buy houses here in West Michigan. For more information about our process, or to get in touch about a cash offer for your home, please give our office a call at 616-379-3090 or leave us a message online, and we’ll get back to you as soon as possible.