Offer on a FSBO With Changing List Price?

[FruGal]

A loose connection is selling her (3-unit) house as a "for sale by owner" and I'm trying to buy it as an investment property. When I initially toured the property she said the asking price would be "around $500k." (I looked it up and that's how much she bought it for in 2008). I was planning on making an initial offer for $10k - $15k less. Flipping through craigslist a few days ago I ran across her house and she'd posted an asking price of $560k. EDIT - I just looked up the property again on craigslist and now it's listed at $579k.

Now I'm unsure of what to do. I'm pretty sure she hasn't received any offers, but I don't want to insult her by coming in too low. The flip side is that she never communicated to me that she's raised the price and, from my preliminary talks with the bank, $500k is about as high as I can get approved for. I'm sitting down with my lender and doing the inspection in two days. How should I approach making this offer?

[SwordGuy]

Your comments are so horribly wrong I don't know where to start.  But I'll try.

You are buying this as an investment property.  Presumably you wish to make a profit.   This is important because what the original owner paid for the property is totally unimportant to you.   You don't give a damn.  Period.   You only care about what is the maximum price you can pay and still make money.

If the seller doesn't like the maximum price you are willing to offer, so be it.   You don't buy it.  If they like that price (or even better, a lower one), you do buy it.  Period.

As for offending the seller, why should you give a damn?   Make an offer that's reasonable to you.

The only reason you should give a damn what the other person wants is that you might be able to creatively meet their needs without putting up so much cash. 


Do you actually know how to calculate whether this will be a profitable rental purchase or not?   Because if you don't know - and I mean REALLY know - you would be a damn fool to put yourself on the hook for HALF A MILLION DOLLARS.

I'll be glad to supply references to books that would be helpful in learning how to do the numbers if you need them.  From your question, I suspect you do.