Aloha everyone and welcome back. This may sound like a broken record, but it is crazy to think that we are almost ¼ of the way through 2025. For those of you reading this from a far I hope the seasons are changing for you and with that it brings the sense of a new year and molting into the newness of 2025. For those of us who are fortunate enough to call the islands home, I hope you just keep on L-I-V-I-N (to quote Mathew McConaughey from dazed and confused). A brief update on myself I have been doing well, trying to stay out of trouble and making my way through life. Meeting new friends and hearing more and more interesting stories everyday. Day to day, the Royal Ali’i Subdivision is underway as there are multiple lots undergoing construction as I am writing this now. It is very cool to see with a 6 month/yearly eye (day to day it can tend to look the same every day, but I assure you lots of progress is being made). My main focus right now is helping some clients, and friends, sell a beautiful 2 bed 2 bath condo in the serene Kona Sea Villas complex.
This month I have been wrestling with what to share with you, then it came to me about 3 times in a week and I thought… Huh, maybe that is something that other folks would find interesting. The premise that came to me was the lost art of bartering and negotiation. In a conversation with my sister, who is selling her own house back in Nebraska, she had asked me: “why did I get no interest at our original price, but when I lowered the asking price down $10,000 we got a lot of attention and multiple offers at that newer low price?” The question that she was asking was why don’t more people offer below the listing price and bring their best in an offer at the original listing price. This was a great question, and what I was able to come up with in my mind was that in our world and our society today the art of bartering and negotiation has kind of taken a back seat. NOT TO SAY THIS IS TRUE FOR EVERYBODY (as I know my mother will probably be reading this and she drives one of the hardest bargains I’ve ever seen or experienced, trust me.)
Anyways, in all seriousness we no longer really barter or negotiate prices on much that we buy. If we go to the grocery store to buy potatoes, a bag of potatoes costs $8. There’s not much that you can do or say about that… I think..? (If anyone wants to look into bartering with your local grocery store let me know if you have any success.) Another example, if you go in to get a new phone or clothes, we pay what they tell us. In my opinion the only two areas really still open in day to day life for bartering and negotiation are in real estate and cars.
A week or so ago I had some clients who were in town and wanted to go look at some properties. After viewing a beautiful house on a hill they had asked me, “how much lower than the listing price could we offer them without it being offensive?” Another great question, and my answer was that an offer only becomes offensive if the market has told them so. For example, if a home is listed at $1M and I were to write an offer for $600k two days after the home was listed on the market. To me that is a fair offer in the sense that at least we can get a conversation started. Then the negotiation would begin. Now that same offer would be insulting to a seller if the seller already has a full price offer in hand. At that point it wouldn’t be a waste of time to write up frankly.
That is what was on my mind this month and I hope you all have a fantastic April coming your way. I look forward to hearing and seeing you in the near future.
Written by Nate Konecky R-S