An Attleboro Story: 7 Offers. Not the Highest Bid. Here's How I Coach My Clients to Win the Room and Get the House.
- David Cutler
- 7 days ago
- 4 min read
A new report from the National Association of Realtors just landed, and one number jumped out at me immediately.
First-time buyers now represent just 26% of the housing market. That is the lowest share ever recorded. At the same time, all-cash buyers have climbed to 21% of all transactions. Those two lines on the chart are nearly touching, and if you are trying to buy your first home right now, that data tells your story.
You are competing against people who do not need a mortgage. People who can close fast, skip contingencies, and make sellers feel like the deal is already done. And you are doing it at a moment when home prices are still elevated and inventory remains tight.
I understand why that feels discouraging. But I want to tell you about a family in Attleboro, because what happened there is the reason I believe strategy and relationships beat price almost every time.
The Offer Is Not the Only Thing You Are Selling
It was the height of the pandemic market. If you were buying in Massachusetts in those years, you remember what it felt like. Homes were going 20, 30, 40 thousand over asking. Buyers were waiving inspections, writing blank checks, doing whatever it took just to get a yes.
My clients were up against 6 competing offers on a home in Attleboro.
They were not the highest bid. They got the house. And here is what made the difference.
From the very first showing, I coach my clients to think beyond the offer. Price is one data point. What sellers are really choosing is who they trust to take over something they have poured years of their life into. That is the real decision. And that decision can be influenced.
A Letter That Brought the Seller to Tears
My client was a native Spanish speaker. English was not their first language, and they wanted to write a personal letter to the seller but were not confident they could fully capture what they wanted to say.
So I wrote it for them.
Not as their agent. As their voice. I sat with them and listened to how they described the home, what it meant to their family, how they imagined their children growing up there, and the pride they would take in caring for every corner of it. Then I put all of that into words that the seller could feel.
When the seller read the letter, she came to tears, and demanded to meet the family.
She chose my clients not because they offered the most money, but because she trusted them with her home. She saw her own story in theirs. She understood exactly who would be walking through her front door next, and she wanted it to be them.
After the offers were reviewed and my clients were selected, something happened that I will never forget. Both families met. They hugged. A home changed hands the way it should, with warmth and intention and genuine human connection.
That is what it means to sell yourself.
Building Advocates on the Other Side
What I did in Attleboro was not a one-time creative move. It is the foundation of how I work with every buyer client, in every market, at every price point.
Before an offer goes in, I am already building a relationship with the listing agent. I ask questions. I listen. I find out what matters most to the seller beyond the numbers. Is it timeline? Is it the story of who comes next? Is it knowing the home will be taken care of?
The goal is always the same: to turn the people on the other side of the deal into advocates for my clients.
That advocacy matters most when things get difficult. And in real estate, things always get difficult eventually. Financing delays happen. Inspections come back with findings. Timelines shift. When the relationship is strong, both sides stay at the table and figure it out. When it is not, deals fall apart over things that could have been resolved with one good conversation.
I have seen both outcomes. The difference is almost always the relationship that was built before the crisis arrived.
What This Means If You Are Thinking About Buying
The NAR data is not meant to discourage you. It is meant to inform you.
Yes, the market is competitive. Yes, cash buyers have advantages. But the advantage of a strong buyer strategy, built on real relationships and genuine human connection, is something that cash alone cannot buy.
If you are a first-time buyer in Massachusetts or Rhode Island, or if you have been in this market for a while and keep losing out, I want to talk. Not to pitch you on anything. Just to show you what a different kind of preparation looks like, and what it has done for families in the same position you are in right now.
The market is not working against you. It is just asking for a different approach.
David Cutler is a Massachusetts real estate agent with David Cutler Real Estate under William Raveis, serving Avon, Stoughton, Canton, Hingham, Plymouth, Brockton, Attleboro, and surrounding communities.
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