Sorry to keep you in suspense, but I am still waiting to hear from our lawyer, should be tomorrow. As far as the appraisal goes, we think we are in good shape. The realtors who actually showed us comps both used the same two houses. One is almost identical to ours, on our street and sold in November for considerably more. The other is on the next block, slightly larger than ours - about 14 square feet or something. It sold for a lot less. However, the house was bought for cash because it would not finance as it was wrecked inside. It sold in January and the buyers still have not moved in. They have replaced damaged sheetrock, plumbing, and the home still has not passed code inspection as of last week. The realtors who used comps factored this house into their calculations, skewing the figure low. I explained this to them, and asked why my home, which has been properly maintained and prepared was being compared to a "fix up", and basically was told because it is there. Both admitted this area is very hard to comp. Two other realtors used the low figure on Zillow to estimate the house, one did so without even coming to see it. Another realtor said she used comps, but would not come out to see us because we are too far from town for her, and it is "too hard" to sell property out here. Another realtor came out but forgot to bring the comps she used with her. Which is how we ended up FSBO, when we really hadn't planned on it. Hopefully, all this turns out to be a blessing in disguise.

My husband and I almost threw away what we considered a low-ball offer. My husband had lived in the house for nearly 20 years and it'd been his grandmother's house before he bought it, so he was very much emotionally attached to the place. At first, he was offended by the offer. But after much talking, we realized this may be our only offer and we better work with it. At the time, the house had been on the market for three months and we had an accepted offer on another house with a sale contingency. We countered and ended up with a compromise. We didn't get as much money as we felt we should have according to the comps or as much as we would have liked to have, but the house closed and we moved and we're happy. This was almost a year ago and, in our area, the housing market has gotten even worse since. I agree with Triciae...this is a tough market that demands a lot of give and take from sellers--mostly give. I would not counter with full list price. This will only say to the buyer that you are unwilling to give. I'd come back somewhere in the middle and offer closing costs. We paid closing costs on the two houses we sold last year. I am SO glad we're no longer on the market!

xamsx-Thank you so much for the advice. I think she has been in business so long in this town, no one has come to her with their own agent. I did sign the dual agency paper. I do have my own real estate attorney. Any inspector, appraiser etc she has reccomended I refused to use and went out of town for them and the roofer and the masonary contractor etc..and the seller being a trial attorney has refused to sign a disclosure form, so that is why I am also so adement on the inspection etc..when this agent saw the oil tank pipes coming out of the ground, she said not to worry they are fine. NOT I had my inspector go over everything then I had some enviromental company come out, now the seller has had them removed and the dirt around it, new oil tanks are in the basement and a certificate was given to the seller that the grounds are ok and negative of any oil spillage etc that will go to me if we should be the ones that get to purchase the home. Also the seller had some black box with a red light with a screetching noise coming out of it plugged in the upstairs hallway, we looked at the house 3 times and all 3 times we asked what is that thing? Agent said she didnt know? Inspector took one look at it and said "Oh thats to keep the bats out of the second floor" HUH??? So right from the get go I could clearly see the agent wasnt going to tell me other than what I could see about the house 7 bedrooms, 31/2 baths, office, den, lvg room, dinning room, kitchen and 3 car garage...the rest of the findings good or bad was going to be left up to me.. We will wait and see what the counter is, put in our best offer and then call it a day...Thank you again for all of your amazing help!!!

Thanks for the advice. I’m disappointed to hear that Navy Fed is playing games — I was hoping that they would do better for military families. I just got off the phone with someone there... they quoted a “best rate” for today of 3.25 % for a 0 point, 30 year mortgage but they charge a 1 point origination fee, plus between $400 -$800 for an appraisal, plus $40 to do a credit check on me and DH, and a “service fee” and a “tax set up fee” and a ”standard fee” and a “flood certification fee” and a bunch of other fees. It was hard to get a straight answer about all the so-called fees. They said from the time they get all the paperwork from us, they need 30-45 days but won’t tell me exactly what paperwork they need until I submit the application and the $40 credit check fee. It seems like A full 1% on a jumbo mortgage is a big fee to start with so why are they nickeling and diming with so many addition fees? Just because they can? ! At the end, after saying that’s the best they can do, they say if two other places give me a better offer, they’ll match. AAGGRrrH. I am going to hate this process! Is this par for the course?