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Reservations and "Buy Now"

The Edgewise reservation and "Buy Now" features modernize the purchasing of residential real estate by moving more of the transaction process online. They act as intermediate steps between a potential buyer showing interest in a project, and signing a Purchase Agreement. Both reservations and Buy Now have been shown to greatly increase buyer conversion rates.

Reservations and Buy Now are both available to all active projects. With a few clicks, your project will be ready to sell online.

Reservations

Reservations are supported for both lots and units (e.g. spec homes). You can set reservation fees to any amount ($250 is the default), as well as add expirations (optional), cancellation fees (optional), and limits (eg, one reservation per unit, ten reservations per project, one reservation per buyer, etc.).

Reservation fees can be collected via credit card (the default), ACH, and even crypto. Free reservations are also supported.

When a buyer places a reservation, the lot/unit is automatically marked as RESERVED. You can use this time to finalize the details of the purchase agreement, review personalization options, and bring the buyer to the finish line.

Edgewise handles refunding of cancelled reservations. Once a reservation is marked as complete, Edgewise will forward reservation fees to the bank account of your choice (eg, wire transfer to the project's escrow account).

Buy Now (online offers)

Edgewise also has a negotiating feature. This allows both parties to informally go back and forth online; while maintaining a paper trail for accountability. The agreed terms serve as deal sheet which can be used to generate a binding agreement (eg, via our DocuSign integration).

Buy Now offers are "invitation to treat" non-binding offers ("an expression of willingness to negotiate").

Upon a reservation with an offer, you'll receive a notification email, with the details of the offer. You can:

  • Accept
  • Reject
  • Counter

Offers expire after 48 hours. Edgewise will send periodic reminder emails to the offeree. If the offeree rejects the offer or the offer expires, the reservation fee will be fully refunded (cancellation fees are waived during negotiations), and the lot/unit will be marked as AVAILABLE at the originally listed price. A counteroffer will restart the 48 hour expiration.

If the offer is accepted, the reservation expiration timer starts, and proceeds as a normal reservation. The offer / reservation process helps continue the momentum after an accepted offer. As with a non-offer reservation, if the reservation expires (even after an accepted offer), the buyer's reservation fee is refunded (minus the cancellation fee), and the lot/unit is marked AVAILABLE at the originally listed price.

Enable Buy Now (Offers) / Reservations:

  1. Navigate to the Reservations / Offers project setting page (Project Profile > Settings > Reservations / Offers)
  2. Select what kind of reservation/offer you would like to enable
  • "Lot Reservations" enable reservations for available lots.
  • "Spec Reservations" enable reservations for specific units in a development.
  • "Spec Offers" enable buyers to offer and negotiate online for specific units. A "Spec Offer" always has an underlying reservation that continues on after the offer is accepted. Enabling "Spec Offers" automatically enables "Spec Reservations."
  1. [Optional] Set a reservation / offer fee

The reservation fee. Since offers have an underlying reservation, this is essentially the price to make an offer as well. This can be set at $0 and is refundable.

  1. [Optional] Set a reservation expiration policy

The duration of a reservation before it expires, in hours. If the reservation is associated with a negotiation, the expiration clock starts when the offer is accepted. If the offer expires or is rejected, the reservation is automatically cancelled. Default is reservations that do not expire. If you set an expiration on reservations, the buyer will receive reminder emails as their reservation comes closer to expiration.

  1. [Optional] Set a reservation auto-cancellation Policy
  2. [Optional] Set a reservation cancellation fee

Example Scenarios

1. Lot/Unit reservation; with a $500 reservation fee, no cancellation fee, and no expiration. The buyer will receive a confirmation and payment receipt email, but no reminder emails (since their reservation doesn't expire). The reservation will never expire. Cancelling the reservation will fully refund the buyer's $500.

2. Lot/Unit reservation; with a $500 reservation fee, $50 cancellation fee, 48 hour expiration, manual cancellation. The buyer will receive a confirmation and payment receipt email. 24 hours before the expiration, the buyer will receive a reminder email. 2 hours before expiration, the buyer will receive a final reminder. If the reservation is not marked as complete at the time of expiration, the reservation will be marked as expired. The reservation fee will not be refunded until the reservation is manually marked as cancelled. Once cancelled, the buyer will receive a $450 refund. The Lot/Unit will be automatically marked as available at the originally listed price.

3. Lot/Unit reservation; $300 reservation fee, $50 cancellation fee, 72 hour expiration, auto-cancel. The buyer will receive a confirmation and payment receipt email. 24 hours before the expiration, the buyer will receive a reminder email. 2 hours before expiration, the buyer will receive a final reminder. If the reservation is not marked as complete at the time of expiration, the reservation will be automatically cancelled. The buyer will receive a $250 refund. The Lot/Unit will be automatically marked as available at the originally listed price.

4. Unit offer; $500 reservation fee, $100 cancellation fee, 7 day expiration, manual cancel. They buyer will receive an offer and reservation confirmation email, as well as a payment receipt email. During negotiations, the reservation expiration is paused. If the offer is rejected, the buyer will receive a FULL refund (the cancellation fee is waived during negotiations). If the offer (or counter-offer) is accepted, the reservation expiration clock starts. On the sixth day, the buyer will receive a reservation expiration reminder email. 2 hours before expiration, the buyer will receive a final reminder email. If the reservation is not marked as complete at the time of expiration, the reservation will be marked as expired. It is not until the reservation is manually marked as cancelled that the buyer will receive a $400 refund and the unit will be marked as available at the originally listed price.