Have you gotten an offer from a so-called investor or cash buyer via email when they haven’t seen the inside of your home? Are you confused about what to do or how to protect yourself? In this article I will pull back the curtains so you can learn how to protect yourself from being scammed by a so-called cash buyer or investor.
First of all, who can really buy your home without first seeing it and inspecting it? The answer is no one. They never intend to buy your home. They intend to control your house by getting it under contract and then assigning that contract to a legitimate cash buyer like Express Homebuyers, that has the cash to actually close on it. Once the contract is signed, they will market the contract (aka your house) to a list of cash buyers they have. These cash buyers will almost always want to see the inside of your home and do a proper inspection. If the investors don’t like your home or if the investor you signed a contract with can’t find a legitimate cash buyer they just back out of the contract and leave you hanging. We unfortunately get these type calls from sellers’ way to frequently.
The practice outlined above is known as assignment of contract or wholesaling a house. Do you want to know how to avoid being taken advantage of? Read the following article How to Avoid Getting Scammed when Selling to a Real Estate Investor (link to this once posted). Last month we spoke with a seller who had received 2 higher offers from out of area investors who emailed them an offer without ever seeing the house. I told them to do the things outlined in the How to Avoid Getting Scammed when Selling to a Real Estate Investor article. The seller called and demanded the 3 contract provisions and he never heard back from them. Why? Because they never intended to buy his home. They intended to wholesale the home. If you have questions feel free to reach out to us.