What to do when your property is resoundingly popular? Even if the potential buyers are overeager, there’s no reason to rush your decision. It’s entirely possible to receive several offers to purchase at once, and you are in no way obligated to answer them right away.

As you receive each offer, set a deadline with the buyer for accepting or refusing. The standard is 24 to 72 hours, but you can choose any timeframe. During this decision-making period, you may decide to negotiate or let the buyers enter a bidding war, by offering more money and/or changing their purchase conditions.

As long as you have not accepted any of the offers or made a counteroffer, verbally or in writing, you can consider all of the offers on the table. In other words, no offer takes precedence, regardless if it’s the first you received or the highest offer. You are free to accept the one you prefer or to turn them all down. The final choice is yours.

Should you disclose the amount of an offer, or not?

First, you should know that a DuProprio client or any homeowner who decides to sell without an intermediary is free to disclose—or not—the amount of the offers to purchase they’ve received to other buyers. Only real estate brokers are duty-bound, by the Real Estate Brokerage Act, not to disclose the amounts of competing offers. 

Some clients feel comfortable disclosing the amount, others not. The important thing is to set a sales strategy that will meet your needs. Every homeowner wants to get the highest price for their property, but also the best sales conditions, like the occupation date and the inclusions/exclusions.

Just remember that it’s always the buyer who decides the absolute most they are willing to pay for a property. That said, you get to decide how the negotiations are held.

Different ways of proceeding

As offers come in, you could, while respecting the response time you and the buyers have agreed on:

• Decide to keep the nature of the offers confidential. Simply look each offer over and set aside the most attractive one(s).
• Disclose the amount of the best offer to potential buyers. You may receive fewer offers as a result, but they will be as competitive as your top offer.

Both approaches have their advantages. For example, if you decide to keep the offers a mystery, you may receive an exceptional offer. If you opt for transparency, it could help you reach an agreement with the buyers of your choosing, rather than risk having them drop out of the running due to the pressure. 

In both cases, you can ask the selected buyers if they would be interested in enhancing their offer. Once again, you have the option of disclosing the amount of the offers or not.

Receive the offers
	Check how much time you have to make your decision.
	Carefully analyze each offer.
	Your options: 1. Refuse all the offers  2. Negotiate or spark a bidding war‍ 3. Accept an offer
	Remember that you must not accept more than one offer at a time!

Verbal acceptance

Be careful! A contract is considered in force as soon as you accept the purchase offer, even if you only do so verbally. That means that if you have agreed on a price and conditions for the offer, the contract has been made. If the conditions are met, you are required to appear before a notary to close the transaction. The written Offer to Purchase is proof of this contract for the bank, for example, when the buyer requests a mortgage.

FAQ