Most offers are lost before anybody writes one. Not on price, and not on nerve, but because the buyer was not actually in a position to act on the Tuesday the right property appeared.
This is what ready looks like, and what to do once you are.
Ready to offer, properly
A real pre-approval, meaning a lender has seen your income documents and pulled your credit, not a rate quote from a website. Know the number and know the conditions attached to it. See Working Out What You Can Actually Afford.
Deposit money that can move in twenty-four hours. Not in a locked GIC, not in a fund that settles in three days, not sitting in an account you would need your spouse present to draw on. This is the most common practical failure and it is entirely avoidable.
A lawyer instructed already. Not researched, not bookmarked. Instructed, with their details in your phone, so a status certificate can be reviewed on a Saturday.
Identification verified. The FINTRAC record done in advance rather than on the evening of an offer, which is where it usually gets discovered. See FINTRAC.
An inspector who answers the phone. If you intend to inspect, have somebody lined up who can attend at short notice, because a five-day condition is not five days if it takes four to get somebody through the door.
A number you have already decided on. Your walk-away figure, agreed between you and whoever else is signing, in daylight, before there is any adrenaline in the room.
Every item above exists so that when the right property appears, the only decision left is whether you want it. A buyer deciding on financing and lawyers and deposits in the same forty-eight hours as the house is a buyer who will hesitate, and hesitation is what loses properties.
The conditions, and what each one costs you
Every condition protects you and weakens the offer. That is the whole trade, and it should be made deliberately rather than by habit or by fear.
Financing. The one I am most reluctant to see dropped. A pre-approval is not an approval on a specific property: lenders appraise the home, and they decline units in buildings they do not like. Without this condition, an appraisal below your price is your problem to fund in cash.
Inspection. Protects you from what you cannot see. It can often be satisfied before the offer instead, with a pre-listing report or a walkthrough with your inspector during a showing, which lets you write firm without writing blind.
Status certificate, on a condominium. Reserve fund, special assessments, litigation, rules, arrears. A lawyer reads it in a day or two. Waiving this on a building you do not know is the riskiest thing on this list and the one buyers most often treat as a formality.
Sale of your existing property. The safest for you and the weakest offer you can write. In competition it is close to unusable. See Buying and Selling Homes at the Same Time.
Once your offer is accepted and your conditions are satisfied, you are buying the property. There is no window to change your mind. That is precisely why the decision to drop a condition has to be made in advance and in the cold, not at eleven at night with three other offers registered.
The deposit as a lever
The deposit is not a fee and it is not the down payment. It is the money you forfeit if you walk, which is exactly why it reads as seriousness.
- Around five per cent is the GTA norm, and it is entirely negotiable.
- A larger deposit strengthens an offer at no real cost to a buyer who is going to close anyway. It is the cheapest concession available.
- "Upon acceptance" is stronger than "within twenty-four hours", which is stronger than a date next week.
- It sits in the listing brokerage's trust account and comes off the price on closing. See How Deposits Work.
When there is competition
The instinct is that the highest number wins. Often it does not, and understanding why is worth more than another ten thousand dollars.
What a seller is actually buying
Certainty. A firm offer at $1,000,000 beats a conditional one at $1,020,000 for a great many sellers, because the second one might evaporate in five days and put the property back on the market wearing a failed deal.
What else moves them
The closing date matching their next purchase. A larger deposit. A clean, correctly completed agreement. Sometimes flexibility on chattels or a short rent-back. These cost you little and are frequently the deciding margin.
Find out how the seller is running it. Offer date, or reviewing as they come? Bully offers considered? Any registered already? Are they looking for a particular closing date? I ask, and listing agents generally answer.
Decide the number away from the moment. Write it down. Then write down what you would think in a year if you lost by five thousand, and separately what you would think if you paid forty over and the market softened. Both regrets are real; pick which one you can live with.
Do not stop on a round number. Almost everyone lands on a multiple of ten thousand, so in a close race several offers arrive at exactly the same figure. Going a few thousand past the round number costs very little each month and puts you clear of the pile.
Ask about an escalation only if the seller invites it. Many will not accept them, and a poorly drafted one tells the other side exactly what you are willing to pay.
Be reachable and be quick. Sign electronically, keep your phone on, and answer within minutes. Deals get shaped in short windows and the buyer who cannot be found gets left behind.
Going in early, before the offer date, with a strong firm price and a short irrevocable. It works more often than people expect and it costs you the chance to see what everyone else would have done. Worth considering where you want the property specifically rather than a property generally, and where the listing is priced sensibly rather than staged low to attract a crowd.
The irrevocable, and other small print
- The irrevocable is how long the seller has to accept before your offer expires. Short pressures them; too short annoys them. Two to six hours on an offer night, longer otherwise.
- The closing date is a negotiating tool, not an administrative detail. Ask what suits them before you pick one.
- Chattels and fixtures should be listed explicitly. Assume nothing is included unless it is written down.
- Schedule B is where the specifics live. Read it. See Common Clauses.
If you lose
You will, at least once, and it is worth knowing in advance that it is survivable. Ask me to find out where it went, because listing agents will usually say afterwards, and that tells us whether you were close on price, beaten on terms, or up against somebody who simply had to have it.
Ask to be kept informed too. Deals collapse on financing and inspections more often than people realise, and the second-place buyer who was pleasant and organised is the first call the listing agent makes.
Tell me your real number, including the one you are slightly embarrassed by. I cannot advise you properly against a figure you have not said out loud, and I would much rather talk you out of overpaying in my car than watch you do it on a keyboard at midnight.