From the buyer perspective?

I know the basics on their business model. Even went as far as to get a quote/bid from them on my house because I was curious and to see how they go about it. Lowball offer, very upfront about outrageous fees and repair costs, definitely not for me. But that isn't my point here.

As a licensed Texas professional inspector I was curious about their inspection clause after that experiment. Today I had the opportunity to inspect one of their listings for a buyer. It was not an encouraging experience. Made me wonder about their "Inspections" even more. There were A LOT of repair items that should have been found on a TREC inspection. They had repaired some items obviously, but most not so much. It gave me the feel of a really poor flip. Almost to the point that I felt like things had been done to hide problems, possibly.

To me this raises questions about what they are doing and disclosing. If an inspection was performed on this house by them, by TREC rules the inspection they have done is required to meet the TREC SoP requirements and be performed by a licensed TREC inspector because it is related to a sale. Then TREC rules say that that inspection must be disclosed to the buyer (any in the last 4 years.) That had not been done in this case, as my buyers had no idea about open door's policies or procedures and had not seen an inspection report.


Things just don't seem to be adding up properly here. Doesn't really change anything about how I did my job in trying to protect my clients. But the experience left me distinctly uncomfortable for some reason.

Wondered if anyone here has thoughts or experiences with them.

I see them around. I came to about the same conclusion as you.

It seems like just another reason to avoid any sort of flipping group, especially from the buyer's end of the deal. Everyone I know who bought one has run into problems within a year. Big ones that were either bad workmanship or flawed design during the flip, or that IMO were covered up.

We put an offer in on one of their homes. They did not like my offer.

They had items listed like new flooring and new paint as their remodeling. The house had something like 8 different floors with 3 different types of wood/ faux wood in the same space with no transitions.

They tried to use comps that were no where close to being similar. Some were several miles away when there were several similar homes that sold in the neighborhood.

The interior would've taken at least 100k to get it to the level of the comps they were trying to show.

They also manipulate sales price by charging ridiculous high fees. The house I put an offer on they had a "sales" price of 375k (if I remember right) but the homeowner only got something like 300 or slightly under. (don't remember exact numbers)

Kevin how much did they say the fees would be on your house?

Wasn't really the point of my post, but..

Their offer basically lays out a comparison between their way and the traditional realtor commission way. Iirc, they were about 10% low on the offer amount. Then they list a fee that amounted to about 14% of their offer amount. They equated that to Realtor commissions . Then they tried to count Realtor commissions again in closing costs by saying the seller's closing costs are 10k traditionally and 2 k with them.

Then they say that if you proceed from their offer point you agree in advance to pay for repairs noted in their inspection. In my case they estimated those would cost between 2 and 8k. Which is absurd.

With their creative accounting methods they managed to say that I would make 2k more selling with them. The whole thing seemed absolutely absurd. Seems the only time it would make any possible sense is if you were in a decent equity situation but had mountains of deferred maintenance. Even then, there have to be better options.

The house I inspected yesterday was much like Braxton described. 5 or 6 different flooring types, basic paint and new AC. There were major problems with just about every system in the house. So obviously they are waiting to do any repairs other than absolutely necessary ones on a buyer beware philosophy.

After thousands of inspections, I have developed a certain gut feel for houses, especially flips. I can usually tell within 15 minutes if it is a good flip or bad. Not only did this emanate a "bad flip" vibe, it had a weird feel. Like things were being hidden. Where as the typical "bad flip" is just a case of poor quality and workmanship and choosing not to do any more than the lipstick on a pig items.

It is the inspection part that concerns me. From the standpoint of a TREC licensed inspector, it seems like they are breaking some rules in that area, but I guess I cannot be sure. Their "inspection" by rule has to be done by a TREC licensed inspector, because it is during the process of sale. I don't see how they could get around that. By the way it has been explained to me, if I go out to a house to do a maintenance inspection for a homeowner (which does not have to follow TREC rules) and he casually tells me he is considering selling, suddenly it falls under TREC guideline. So I don't see a way they could get around that. They could have agreement that modifies the inspection process and departs from TREC standards. That is allowed between client and inspector. But the inspection is still considered a TREC inspection. So the report / findings should be disclosed to the buyers since OD is now aware of them.

I know it is a small sampling, but man it felt really really shady.

I would be a little suspicious about only 50 customer reviews after buying/selling 13,700.

Seems like a great business model...exaggerate the fees you would pay in the traditional model and lowball the seller after getting first crack at their business. There are enough naive people that think they'll get top dollar this way.

We are currently selling our house, and I got an offer from them just to see how close it would be. The offer was 10% lower than what we ended up listing for (before "repairs"). The fees were in the same ballpark as what you would pay to list (even though they try to convince you they're a lot better).

That 2% "typical seller contribution" is horse**** and just thrown in there to make their fees look better.

I just got another offer to see how it compared to one from February. The offer is the same, but they now want 7% for their fee (it was 5%) plus 1.2% for "other clothing costs".

They try to buy paint and carpet houses and flip. They do a crappy job and put in some cheap appliances and mark it up really high to see if anyone will bite. I notice that most of their homes have really big price reductions. Honestly I don't see how they make money. They have a lot of overhead and advertising, and probably lose money on some transactions.

I've appraised a couple, they were really crap as well.

I showed one not long ago. It was an 80's house with wood windows. Most of them would not open. I told the buyers that this was a lawsuit waiting to happen.

Not a fan.

Oh ya I forgot to mention they listed basically everything on the disclosures as unknown.

There was a spot that was obviously recently repaired water damage. I asked about the origin of the damage. "Agent" said the owner had no clue as he never lived there. I asked them about the inspection they did on the home two months prior and she said "oh we don't keep those."

Braxton.Sherrill said:

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Oh ya I forgot to mention they listed basically everything on the disclosures as unknown.

There was a spot that was obviously recently repaired water damage. I asked about the origin of the damage. "Agent" said the owner had no clue as he never lived there. I asked them about the inspection they did on the home two months prior and she said "oh we don't keep those."

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Isn't that breaking a law? Arent you required to disclose any and all inspection reports within a certain time frame?

Certainly seems like it is to me.