One of the most common questions Pittsburgh homeowners have before accepting a cash offer: How did you come up with that number?
It’s a fair question, and the answer is more transparent than most sellers expect. Here’s how cash buyers — including us — calculate what we can pay for a Pittsburgh home.
Step 1 — After Repair Value (ARV)
The starting point is ARV: what the home would sell for on the open market after it’s been fully repaired and updated to current buyer expectations. We pull recent comparable sales (comps) in the same neighborhood — homes that are similar in size, age, and condition that have sold within the last 90-180 days. Pittsburgh’s neighborhoods vary significantly in price, so we use hyper-local comps, not county-wide averages.
Step 2 — Repair Estimate
We walk the property and estimate what it would cost to bring it to retail condition. This includes roofing, HVAC, plumbing, electrical, kitchen, baths, flooring, and cosmetic work. We use real contractor pricing for the Pittsburgh market — not lowball estimates, not inflated ones.
Step 3 — Carrying and Transaction Costs
Cash buyers factor in the cost of holding the property while it’s being repaired and listed: property taxes, insurance, utilities, and financing costs (even cash buyers account for opportunity cost). We also factor in the costs of selling — agent commissions, title insurance, closing costs on the resale.
Step 4 — The Offer
The formula is roughly: ARV − repairs − holding costs − transaction costs − a margin that allows us to stay in business = your cash offer. That margin is real — we’re buying a property with risk and capital, and we need to be compensated for it. But it’s also where we can be efficient: the faster we can close, the lower our carrying costs, and the better offer we can make.
What this means for you
A cash offer will typically be below what you’d net in a perfect retail sale — but a perfect retail sale takes 60-90 days, requires repairs, carries commissions, and can fall apart at any point. The question isn’t “is the cash offer lower?” — it’s “does the speed, certainty, and simplicity justify the difference for my situation?”
For many Pittsburgh homeowners, the answer is yes.
To find out what we’d offer for your property, call (412) 784-6698) or submit your address at sellmyhousefastpittsburghpa.com. No obligation. No pressure. We cover all of Allegheny County and surrounding areas.