You Can Still Get Gazumped in This Housing Market!

According to Wikipedia the verb " gazump" means to refuse to formalize a property sale agreement at the last minute in order to accept a higher offer. The word is thought by some people to have come from the Yiddish word gazumph meaning to swindle or overcharge. When property prices are in decline, the practice of gazumping becomes rare. But guess what, it is still alive and well in Chicago, and happened to my buyers. As luck would have it, the second offer the sellers accepted fell apart, and my buyers were able to buy the property after all.....at a price LESS than originally agreed! They were able to negotiate a lower price because the sellers had already entered into a contract for purchase and were, therefore, under time and monetary pressures to sell. While not a technical "gazunder" (the term gazunder refers to the practice whereby the buyer waits until everybody is poised to exchange contracts before lowering the offer on the property, threatening the collapse of a whole chain of house sales waiting for the deal to go through, the effect was, in the end, the same.....and was poetic justice! For more information contact me by visiting my website or call 312-264-5864 or e-mail cengel@rubloff.com.