We Bought a Marlborough Park House With No Showings

Nobody walked through B and E's house. No sign on the lawn, no lockbox on the door, no Saturday afternoons spent driving around the neighbourhood while strangers opened their closets. One offer, read out loud at their own kitchen table, and a closing date they picked themselves.

This is what that sale looked like from the first visit to the deposit, in Marlborough Park NE, this month.

A 1973 split, and two people who had already decided

B and E bought the house in 1997 — a four-level split built in 1973, on a quiet crescent in Marlborough Park NE. They have lived in it ever since.

They are both in their seventies, and by the time Matthew met them the decision was made: they had already bought a condo for their retirement. What was left was not whether to sell. It was how, and they were clear about that too.

Three things, in their own order:

• No showings.
• A price they felt was fair.
• A date that fit the condo, not the market.

Listing does badly on the first one by design. A house on MLS has to be shown, and it has to be kept ready to be shown, on somebody else's schedule — which for two people packing up twenty-nine years is not a small ask.

The first visit was mostly listening

Matthew went over and they walked him through the house. They told him why they were selling, what they wanted out of it, and when they needed it done. That was the whole first visit.

One thing gets said early, every time, because it changes what kind of conversation this is: we are the buyer, not your agent. Matthew is a licensed real estate associate in Alberta, but here he was not listing the house and not representing the seller. He was the person on the other side of the table, buying for his own company. That is a different relationship from the one most people expect when a licensee walks in, and they are entitled to know which one they are in before anything else happens.

One offer, by email, then a week of quiet

Matthew took what he had seen back to the Direct Home Buyer team and we worked out a number. What went to B and E was a single offer in writing, by email: cash, no showings, no financing condition, no inspection condition. Not a range. Not a "starting at". A firm number, and the terms that came with it.

Then a week went by.

That week is the part worth noticing. There was nothing for B and E to chase and nothing hanging over them — no lender to satisfy, no inspector to book, no competing buyer whose deposit might not clear. Just a piece of paper to think about for as long as they wanted to. They emailed back and said yes.

The sequence — visit, offer, signing, closing — is the same one set out on how selling to us works. B and E's is simply one run through it with real dates attached.

Reading it out loud, line by line

An offer that arrives as a PDF is a document. An offer somebody reads to you at your own table is a decision.

So Matthew drove back to Marlborough Park with the offer printed on paper, sat down with both of them, and went through it line by line — what each clause meant, what it obliged us to do, what it obliged them to do — checking as he went that both of them, not just one of them, followed it. Then they signed in front of him, and he signed for Direct Home Buyer.

"I print it out and we read it together, line by line. Nobody should sign something they have not understood."

The deposit, and what "sold" actually means

The next day the deposit went to the lawyer's office.

It is worth being precise about what that does, because "sold" gets used loosely. With no conditions left in the contract there is nothing for either side to waive and nothing left to fall through: the deal is firm, and it binds us exactly as much as it binds them. What has not happened yet is the part that makes it legal fact — ownership moves when the lawyers register the transfer at Alberta Land Titles on closing day and the money changes hands. Two different events, weeks apart, and your own lawyer is the person to walk you through both on your own sale.

What was never on the list

Nothing in the house was repaired. Nothing was cleaned for us. Nobody was shown through it. There was no inspection condition and no financing condition, and there was no commission — a commission is what you pay an agent to sell your house, and nobody sold this house. We bought it.

If you would rather have the arithmetic than the story, how we work out the price sets out what we start from and what comes off it, including the things that come off at the lawyer's office on any sale, such as the mortgage payout and the adjustments.

The date belonged to them

Closing is at the end of October.

Not because that suits us. B and E take possession of their condo in the middle of October, and they wanted two clear weeks to move their things across before the house has to be empty. So that is the date on the contract.

They also do not have to empty it. Anything they decide not to take can stay exactly where it is, and we deal with it afterwards. We would rather clear a house ourselves than have two people in their seventies making trips to the landfill in October.

When this is the wrong way to sell

Here is the part most cash-buyer pages leave out.

B and E's house is in good order — somebody looked after those floors for nearly thirty years. Put a house like that on MLS with time to spare, price it properly and let a few buyers compete for it, and it will usually bring more than we will pay, often more even after the commission comes off. That is not a secret, and it is not an argument against listing.

What B and E bought from us was not the highest number. It was certainty and a calendar: a firm deal with nothing left to fall through, nobody walking through their home, and a possession date chosen to fit a condo rather than a market. Those are worth something, and what they cost is the gap between our number and a good MLS result.

Matthew says it more plainly than a marketing department would:

"If your house is in good to great condition and you're not in a hurry, listing with a Realtor may be a better option — and I'll tell you so to your face."

If you are somewhere in between, get both numbers. Ask a Realtor what your house would list for and what it would net after commission and time on market, then ask us what we would pay, and compare two real figures instead of a figure and a feeling. If you are doing this for a parent rather than for yourself, helping a parent sell covers the parts that are different when the house is not yours.