Step 6: Make the Offer

Step 6.1 — Build the offer from the worksheet, not from the ask

The seller's asking price is information, not an anchor you must respect. Start from your MAO, subtract anything the worksheet has not covered yet (assignment margin if you are wholesaling, extra contingency for a rough house), and that is your offer zone. Open where the conversation can move, but never open above a number you would happily close at. Every concession you make should trade for something real: a faster close, access for buyers or contractors, personal property included, or a cleaner timeline. Concessions given for free teach the other side to keep asking.

Step 6.2 — Put it in writing, plainly

A written offer on a real contract form beats a verbal promise in every way that matters: terms are visible, deadlines are real, and both sides can show it to a spouse, an attorney, or a title company. Keep the language plain and the numbers complete — price, earnest money, closing date, contingencies, and what happens if a deadline is missed. Step 8 covers the contract itself in depth. If your state or your attorney uses a standard form, use it. Hand-written side agreements and creative paperwork inventions are where beginners create legal problems out of ordinary deals.

Step 6.3 — Present the number with the reasoning attached

Sellers accept low offers more often when they understand them. Walk through the math briefly and respectfully: what the house will be worth finished, what the work costs, what a buyer or a bank will require. Do not exaggerate repairs or invent problems — sellers can smell it, and the deal dies with your credibility. If the seller needs something other than top price — time, certainty, help with a move, a lease-back where the law allows it — trade on those terms. Many deals are won on flexibility the worksheet never modeled.

Step 6.4 — Handle the counter without chasing

A counteroffer is progress, not rejection. Return to the worksheet before you respond: what changed, and does the new number still fit under your ceiling? If it does, consider it on its merits. If it does not, say so clearly, leave your best number on the table with a reasonable response window, and be genuinely willing to walk. Walking away politely keeps the door open — sellers who refuse in week one call back in week six when their other plan fails, but only if the last conversation was respectful.

Step 6.5 — Protect the deal after the yes

A verbal yes is the start, not the finish. Get signatures the same day where possible, deliver earnest money exactly as the contract requires, calendar every deadline, and confirm the title company has everything it needs. Most lost deals die of drift in the seventy-two hours after acceptance. Your speed and organization in that window are part of what the seller bought when they chose your offer over a higher, flakier one. Carry that same discipline into Step 8 and the contract terms you are about to sign.

Do this step now

Do not just read this step — work it. Open the Wholesaling Calculator and run one real or practice property through it, then read the full guide for this step: Contracts and Assignments Explained. Write down what you produced — a number, a list, a decision — in a deal file you will keep. Every later step assumes that artifact exists. If a term on this page is new to you, the glossary defines it with a worked example, and the topic hubs gather everything on the subject in one place. Progress in this business is mostly finished paperwork and honest numbers, repeated until they compound.

How you'll know this step is done

This step is done when you can point to the artifact it produced — a written decision, a worked number, a list, a signed paper, or a log entry — and explain, in plain language, how you got it and what would change it. If you can only say you read about it, the step is not done yet, and moving on anyway is how gaps hide until a live deal finds them at the worst price. It is also done when you know your own weak point inside it: the input you estimated instead of verified, the conversation you are avoiding, the deadline you have not calendared. Name that weak point in your deal file and give it a date. Steps in this path are not school subjects to pass once; they are stations you will revisit on every deal, faster each time, because the artifact from the last deal becomes the template for the next one.