# Auction the home or private agreement?



## jin (Sep 9, 2014)

Hi all

My wife is pushing hard for me to auction the family home or sell to her parents privately.

Background to this is that I moved out last December and have been renting since. Few months ago WW said she wants to buy me out and the amount would be the rates valuation value. This is a nominal number only and quite below the market value. She said she would put the home in a trust for our son so it would be a good thing for me to do.

Few weeks after that her mother was putting pressure on me to just settle as it would be good for our son. He should grow up in the same house, dont put him through the stress of moving and wife will leave the house for him only because she wont be with another man and wont have any more children. 

Few days later I found out she was at an auction to buy another house. Her family know because they went to the auction with her. The house she was looking at was close to where her OM lives. Needless to day I was pretty angry at the lies being spun trying to manipulate me and screw me out of money. I still am because her family originally said they supported me and werent happy with wife. That didnt last long.

Anyway they have come clean wife wants to move and the family want to buy the home and upped their offer to which is probably close to market value excluding agents commission.

Im leaning towards accepting a private sale. The option of selling it via auction is that it could go higher as the property market here is crazy and prices going up day by day. But at least if I sell privately its not some **** that they will hold against me or bs my son into saying house sold because of daddy. I have all the emails anyway but its just less stressful that going through an auction. A part of me would also just like to auction to piss off wife and family.

So my question is whether there are any downsides to a private sale that im not seeing? Any thoughts or opinions are very welcome as its been on my mind for so long.


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## kristin2349 (Sep 12, 2013)

Have you had a licensed Realtor come out and give you an idea of the market value?

In my area auctions signal distress and usually bring less money and the outcome is unpredictable. Private sale is only good if you know what the house is worth in the current market.


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## jin (Sep 9, 2014)

kristin2349 said:


> Have you had a licensed Realtor come out and give you an idea of the market value?
> 
> In my area auctions signal distress and usually bring less money and the outcome is unpredictable. Private sale is only good if you know what the house is worth in the current market.


Yes have had a few give indications of the value and the offer on the table is in line with those valuations.

In our area there is a severe shortage of available homes and prices have been rapidly rising for a number of years now and still going up. All houses sell via auction as a result because its a sellers market. Im not in the US btw.

I should add that wifes family dont know the auction she went to was close to her OM. I havent said anything about it to them because it would reveal that I still have access to her email.


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