1636 Meridian Avenue in South Pasadena was one of the most unique homes I have ever sold in my time selling South Pasadena real estate. It was in extremely rough condition. I thought it might just be a tear down – that’s how beat up it was. There were literally holes in the roof where water would leak in and at one point the water had soaked the ceiling in one of the bedrooms and caused the ceiling to fall into the room. The lack of maintenance was one issue with the property. Another was that it was on a pretty main street: Meridian Avenue. Finally – there was also a death in the property. You can see the original video tour showing the property condition below.
With all the obstacles in the way of a clean and easy sale, it became an exercise in explaining to each and every buyer exactly what they would be buying. I told them about the condition issues and sent them the video tour so they could observe the somewhat disastrous state of the property. I discussed the circumstances of the death with every potential buyer. Since the property was so rough and would definitely not qualify for any type of conventional loan – I made it clear that this was an all cash sale.
In retrospect – I can see that the listing price was set too low. I thought the price was fair – because we placed the property on the market at land value. I estimated that lot to be worth around $699,000. What happened was that the extremely low price point drew enormous interest and subsequently a huge volume of phone calls, texts and emails. Since the property had to be shown with supervision (due to the very rough condition) that meant I had to essentially vet every single potential buyer prior to a property visit.
After the vetting, I conducted private tours of the home with about 40 well qualified potential buyers. Each potential buyer had understood the special conditions and circumstances of the property sale and were still very interested in viewing the property.
Out of that group of buyers the seller received 20 all cash offers. A few were lowball offers, a few were around the asking price, and the majority of the offers were above the asking price. Some were much higher than the listing price.
Based on the strength of the top offers, we made counter offers available and communicated the best terms to the buyers who had submitted a written offer. The result was a great sale for the seller of $1,100,000. That’s fully 57 percent above the original listing price. The terms were fantastic and the sale closed very quickly – allowing the new owner to take possession and the seller to move on to other projects.
If you or someone you know needs help selling a home in or around South Pasadena – reach out any time. It would be my pleasure to count you among my valued clients.
Derek
