BUYER STRATEGY | CEDAR & STONE REALTY GROUP | MAY 2026

The Home Sold Three Times Before You Got the Keys

Most buyers think getting the offer accepted is the finish line.

I understand why. You've toured homes, done the math, lost sleep over competing offers, and finally heard the words every buyer is waiting to hear: they accepted. It feels like winning. It is winning — round one.

What most buyers don't realize until they're in the middle of it is that a real estate transaction isn't one negotiation. It's three. And the second and third ones catch a lot of people completely off guard.

The first sale is the offer. You write it, the seller accepts it, you're under contract. That's the one everyone talks about.

The second sale is the inspection. Your inspector goes through the home and finds things — they are paid to find things — and suddenly you're back at the negotiating table. What do you ask for? What do you let go? How do you protect yourself without blowing up a deal you worked hard to get? This is where I see more transactions fall apart than anywhere else, and almost never because of what the inspector actually found. It's how the conversation that follows is handled.

The third sale is the appraisal. If you're financing the purchase, your lender orders an appraisal. If it comes in below the purchase price, you have a gap to navigate — and how you navigate it depends entirely on how your contract was written and how experienced your agent is at holding a deal together under pressure.

Three sales. Most buyers only prepare for one.

This week I'm going to walk through each of them — what to expect, what to watch out for, and what separates the buyers who close smoothly from the ones who don't. Because getting the offer accepted is the starting gun, not the finish line.

And the race doesn't actually end until you're holding the keys.

— Stacey Cedar & Stone Realty Group | Serving the Portland Metro & Southwest Washington