Making Purchase Offers on Multiple Homes

Reader question: Can you bid on more than one home at a time?

When you refer to "bidding" on a home, it brings to mind a real estate auction. But I'm not sure that's what you mean. If you are asking if it's possible to make offers on multiple homes at once, then here's our response:

Yes, you can make an offer on more than one home at a time. But it's not a strategy I would recommend to most home buyers. If you are in a highly competitive buyer's market, where homes are being sold within days of the listing, then it might be a strategy worth pursuing.

But there's an important factor to keep in mind here -- the earnest money part of the equation.

When you make a purchase offer on a home that's for sale, you will typically be required to put earnest money down with your offer. This is sometimes referred to as a deposit, and that's essentially what it is. You will put down a certain amount of money to show the seller that you're serious about buying their home.

In most cases, you will give the earnest money to the seller's agent, who will put it into an escrow account. If you proceed with the purchase, then the earnest money / deposit will be applied to the actual purchase price. But if you back out of the deal without a good reason, then the seller will keep the earnest money.

So if you are making purchase offers on more than one home at a time, and you are paying earnest money each time, there's a good chance you could lose the deposit amount. Let's say you put offers in on two homes and pay earnest money on both of them. If both of your offers get accepted by the sellers, then you'll have to back out of one of the deals (unless you actually intended to buy two homes). So you'll lose the earnest money deposit on the other home.

You can see why I don't recommend this strategy in most cases.

If you were in fact talking about real estate auctions (instead of a regular home purchase), then it's an easier question to answer. Bidding on more than one home at a real estate auction is possible, as long as you have the money to cover both properties. At a real estate auction, you have to pay for the home in cash or check at the actual auction. But I have a feeling you were referring to multiple purchase offers on a home through the regular buying process, as outlined above. So you can probably disregard this last paragraph.