Congratulations on finding an apartment you love! It’s an exciting time and hopefully this is the one.
Obviously, you want to buy the apartment for as little as possible, but it is important to remember the main objective is to actually buy it and not miss out, as well as paying a fair price. If you are in the market looking for bargains then there is no point doing all the inspections and research, you can just go from apartment to apartment and offer the agent 20% less than the asking price in the hope that one day someone accepts it.
If the apartment is being auctioned, the price you pay will be sorted out at the auction and you hope the bidding stops before it reaches your limit and you win.
If it is a private sale and assuming you have been following the Apartment Hunters MAP Workbookprocess, you will already have a confident feel for the market and what you are prepared to pay. The objectives are now knowing what you want to pay, landing the deal, and doing so at the lowest possible price. if you are too cute with your offers you may miss out.
As we have discussed valuing property (which is essentially what you are doing in your negotiation) is not an exact science and an apartment’s value will sit within a 2% to 3% range of its value. So if is value is about $600,000 then you may pay anywhere between say $590,000 to $610,000.
The best offer is one that is at the lower end of this range but with some room to move as culturally we all need to feel we have had a win in a negotiation.
After that it is a matter of just trying to agree a price as close to the lower end of that range as possible and there are many scenarios that can play out.
Being open and transparent with the agent helps, and you will find they will engage well with you and help you agree a price with the owner.
Like everything involved in buying an apartment if negotiating is not your thing, engage an expert to advise or act for you.
