Front Porch Wisdom: What Thirty-Seven Years of Negotiating Has Taught Me About Human Nature

Front Porch Wisdom

What Thirty-Seven Years of Negotiating Has Taught Me About Human Nature

After 37 years in real estate, I’ve negotiated a lot of contracts.

I’ve represented buyers who were afraid of losing the house they loved, sellers who were deeply attached to homes where they raised their families, people who wanted every last dollar, and people who simply wanted the whole thing over with.

And somewhere along the way, I learned something:

Real estate negotiations are rarely just about the money.

They’re about people.

Early in my career, I thought successful negotiation was mostly about numbers. Price. Credits. Repairs. Closing costs. Dates.

Those things certainly matter. But over the years, I’ve learned that what appears on the contract isn’t always what matters most to the people signing it.

Sometimes a seller isn’t upset about the amount of a repair request. They’re offended because they feel the buyer is criticizing a home they’ve lovingly cared for.

Sometimes a buyer digs in over something relatively small because they’re frightened they’re already paying too much.

Sometimes one side becomes so determined not to let the other side “win” that both parties risk losing something they actually want.

And sometimes emotions enter a transaction from a place you don’t expect.

The Transaction I Still Remember

Years ago, I represented a buyer who submitted a backup offer on a home she really wanted.

The seller already had an accepted offer, but that buyer’s purchase was contingent upon selling his current residence. The contractual time period for doing so had already passed.

My buyer was paying cash. She didn’t have a home to sell, didn’t need financing, and was prepared to close within days.

You might think what happened next would have been fairly straightforward.

It wasn’t.

The listing agent very much wanted the original buyer to get the house, and the delays began.

Throughout that time, I followed up regularly on behalf of my buyer. She was paying cash, had no home to sell, didn’t need financing, and was prepared to close within days. She deserved to know where things stood.

But instead of getting straightforward answers, my follow-up calls increasingly became a source of conflict. The listing agent would become angry with me for continuing to ask when the original buyer’s contingency would be resolved.

Eventually, she served the original buyer with a 3-Day Notice to Perform—a formal notice giving the buyer a specified period of time to satisfy the required contractual obligation.

But even then, the disagreement continued.

The listing agent insisted that in calculating those three days, the first day didn’t count, the last day didn’t count, and the weekend didn’t count either.

During one of our conversations, she became particularly angry, yelled at me, and told me I didn’t know what I was doing.

There was another complication. Ordinarily, when two agents reach this kind of impasse, their brokers can step in and help resolve it. In this particular case, her broker was also her husband, so that avenue wasn’t particularly helpful.

I remember thinking that I had a choice.

I could get angry, too. I could make the disagreement personal. Or I could keep my attention where it belonged—on the contract, the deadlines, and the buyer I had promised to represent.

So I kept following up.

 

I’ve never forgotten that transaction, because it reinforced something I’ve relied upon many times since:

Certainty isn’t the same thing as being correct. And volume isn’t a negotiating strategy.

Everyone Brings Something to the Negotiating Table

A real estate transaction may look like a collection of contracts, deadlines and numbers, but every person involved brings something else to the table.

Expectations. Fear. Pride. Attachment. Past experiences.

And occasionally, a personal preference about how they believe things should turn out.

That includes buyers and sellers. And yes, sometimes it includes their agents.

One of the most important responsibilities of a real estate professional is recognizing those emotions without allowing them to take control of the transaction.

People Want to Feel Heard

One of the most valuable things I’ve learned in negotiation is not to assume I know why someone has taken a particular position.

When someone says, “Absolutely not,” there’s usually something behind it.

Maybe it’s money. But it might also be fear, pride, timing, inconvenience, uncertainty – or something happening in their life that has nothing to do with the house.

You don’t discover that by talking louder. You discover it by asking questions and listening to the answers.

Winning Isn’t Always Winning

Real estate negotiations can become surprisingly emotional.

I’ve watched people become so focused on getting the better end of a negotiation that they nearly lost sight of why they were negotiating in the first place.

The buyer wanted the house. The seller wanted to sell it. That should give everyone some common ground.

My job isn’t to “beat” the other agent or the other party. My job is to protect my client’s interests while looking for a path that allows the transaction to move forward.

Those are two very different things.

Small Things Can Become Big Things

I’ve seen transactions involving hundreds of thousands of dollars nearly fall apart over relatively small amounts of money.

From the outside, that can seem ridiculous. But once emotions become involved, the dollar amount may no longer be the issue.

That’s when experience becomes valuable.

Sometimes the best thing an agent can do is help a client separate the emotional reaction of the moment from the larger decision:

If we walk away over this, will we be glad we did six months from now?

Sometimes the answer is absolutely yes. And sometimes that question changes everything.

Kindness Isn’t Weakness

This may be the lesson I value most.

You can negotiate firmly without being unpleasant.

You can protect your client’s interests without humiliating the person on the other side.

You can say no without turning a transaction into a battle.

And you don’t have to match someone else’s behavior in order to stand your ground.

In fact, I’ve found that people are often more willing to find common ground when they feel they’re being treated fairly and respectfully.

That doesn’t mean giving something away simply to keep everyone happy.

It means remembering that there are human beings on both sides of the contract.

Thirty-Seven Years Later…

I still can’t predict exactly how a negotiation will unfold.

People will always surprise you.

But after 37 years, I know that the strongest negotiator isn’t necessarily the person who talks the toughest, raises their voice, or refuses to budge.

Very often, it’s the person who stays calm enough to understand what really matters.

The numbers matter. The contract matters. The deadlines matter.

But understanding the people sitting on the other side of that contract – and not allowing their emotions to become your emotions?

That can make all the difference.