Home seller made more, thanks to Facebook

Want to better the odds that you won't get the best possible deal on the house you're trying to buy?

Before you’ve closed, tell your friends -- and the world -- via your Facebook account how much you love the house and that you’ll spend anything to get it. Chances are the seller might be reading.

Steve at brip blap explained how this happened in real life in a post wryly called “How to make money on Facebook.”

Steve's cousin Stan and Stan's wife, Elaine, put their house up for sale after they moved into their smaller empty-nester place. Several months later, they got an offer with an earnest check attached. Within five minutes, Elaine used the information on the check to find the prospective buyers' Facebook page. Steve wrote:

What did she find? Posts on their Facebook wall about how they had found their dream home. How they would pay anything to get it. Links to pictures -- gushing comments from their friends and family. In short, drool splattered (electronically) all over Facebook. The buyers were even inviting all of their friends over for a big party the weekend after closing. Elaine found all of this -- before the final price had even been agreed on!

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Now, didn’t that just put Stan and Elaine in the catbird seat? Knowing how much the buyers wanted the house, they could be tougher negotiators -- rejecting changes to the contract and requested repairs that would have cost them money.

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There’s a lesson to be learned from this, Steve said: “Keep your mouth shut online while the deal is ongoing.” Better yet, show restraint in all your social media meanderings.

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Steve said he’s learned you should always assume that “every single person on the planet may be reading your posts/tweets/wall messages, no matter how unlikely you might think that could be, and even the most harmless comments can have effects you couldn’t predict.”

Do you have a similar story to tell? Go ahead and share with our readers.

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