The mad – and very fashionable – 'expressions of interest'

Possibly the maddest – but fashionable – phrase used in the marketing of million-dollar homes in Sydney’s exclusive eastern suburbs is the ubiquitous for sale “by expressions of interest”.

You can imagine eager buyers as they leaf from page to page of glossy images of luxury properties along the sparkling harbour foreshore in the weekly dose provided by our very own local Wentworth Courier.

Well, of course it’s obvious, reasons the somewhat puzzled buyer. “Expressions of interest” just means that I should phone the agent and say that I am interested. He or she will give me a price and I’m well on my way to owning the pile I have always dreamed about.

But wait a minute, what if the agent can’t give me a price range because he or she doesn’t actually have one? And hang on again – what if the vendors have agreed to the wording of “by expressions of interest” because they have such an outrageous price in mind that the agent doesn’t dare to print it?

Well, no worries, concludes the interested buyer. What I’ll do is phone the agent and make a completely outlandish expression of my interest and see what he says and that will get the ball rolling for sure.

Now of course I have a fair idea that my dream home is worth about a million (based on the mother-in-law’s invaluable advice and my own research in the same street) so what I’ll do is phone the agent and say, “OK, $750,000, and that’s my best offer”. And crikey, this does get a response as I am clearly a real buyer and worth at least two minutes of his busy schedule.

His instant response is “Sorry, I don’t know the actual asking price, that’s why we are asking for interesting expressions. I mean even the vendor doesn’t know what he wants exactly but I’ve already got a firm offer of roughly over $750,000. Why don’t you try in the mid-ones?” So the buyer replies: “You mean the vendor is looking for twice what I just offered?” A pause and he replies “No, but you are somewhere in the ballpark”.

In these circumstances I feel for the vendor, the agent and the prospective buyer. Before I morphed myself into a buyers’ agent and worked as a real estate sales agent I loved the old system of “for sale by private treaty”. I understood the term and everyone else involved was on the same page from day one. There was actually a price tag on a property then, but clearly times have changed!