BIDDER IS BETTOR
Edmond home for sale, $1
EDMOND — Four bedrooms, four baths, fourcar garage, 4,036 square feet, for sale for $1 — no typos.
Grand entry, tons of space, large great room, study, formal dining, upstairs game room wet bar, balcony, theater room, outdoor living space, saltwater pool — no fooling.
But.
Dan and Sharla Bradley took real estate agent Ryan Hukill up on a crazy-sounding idea he's bounced off sellers for years: List their house for $1, hold open house, ride the buzz, and hope for a bidding contest and profitable sale.
So they hope. The market will decide — in this case, a veritable auction this weekend on the Multiple Listing Service.
Hukill said the sellers will consider the best offer received by Tuesday. Open house will be from 2 to 4 p.m. Sunday.
The Bradleys built their custom home at 9852 W Charter Oak Road, on 2 acres on the northeast corner at N Pennsylvania Avenue, in 2012.
Now, with one of three children leaving the nest, it's time to downsize.
They'll move into another custom home this summer a mile or so away.
They're in no super rush.
But when Hukill, an agent with Keller Williams Elite, 5629 N Classen Blvd., hit them with the $1 idea, they were game.
"I've always been up
for a challenge," Sharla Bradley said. "He was like 'I've always wanted to do this.' Sure. Why not?"
"We don't have anything to lose," her husband said, adding: "It's in God's hands."
They are not obligated to accept any offer, but they hope to get a solid one.
"We decided to let the market set the price for us because this is a pretty unique property," Hukill said. "We feel like there's always the possibility of overpricing or underpricing a property like this, and if we're going to underprice to get the market to set the price, we might as well go as low as we can and let people tell us what they think it's worth."
He said finding good comps — comparable sold properties — to use as a guide in setting a list price is difficult in such a situation.
"It's a large house on a hard corner out here in Deer Creek schools, which is highly desirable. Two acres. All the features here, it's got — every bedroom is a suite. It's really a neat floor plan. It's got a great pool. A great tree-lined creek out here. Finding other properties like this in the MLS, past solds, is really difficult," Hukill said.
He was pleasantly surprised when the Bradleys took him up on the $1 experiment.
"They were actually really excited. They're the first ones that ever got excited about it," Hukill said. "I've had this conversation with lots of sellers over the years, that the market really sets the price. We can always overprice, which can be damaging. But underpricing in a decent, active market really isn't possible. I've always used that $1 example, and the kind of buzz that might generate. These folks jumped all over it."
Hukill listed the home on the MLS and on social media late Friday morning and the buzz had started by early afternoon.
"Yessssz !!!! I've always wanted to do that !!!! " a real estate agent commented.
"Love this!!! So exciting!" posted another.
"This is epic. Wonder how this will skew (MLS) stats? 'Sold, 500,000% above list price,' " someone pointed out.
Hukill posted: "It's going to be a crazy few days! Things are already blowing up."
And if the offer attracts nothing but lowballs?
"If we don't find our list price — and we obviously have some number in mind of what we feel like the market is probably going to bear — we'll just start back over with a traditional listing if we need to," he said.