Home BayReviews of homebay.com

Uninterested, disengaged and sloppy. I wanted to wait to write a review to give them a chance, but my thoughts haven't changed. The model doesn't work yet... they promisse the moon and then you are pretty much left to do everything on your own, there's no direct contact, only a generic number nobody answers, your realtor calls you only when convenient, s/he is not in the area, usually busy with 1000 other listings...

The pros: Home Bay saved us a few dollars with seller/broker fees. Initially, the process was relatively easy. Setting up an account. However, it became more difficult as the process continued - - showing and selling of our home. The cons: When we received an offer on our property, the buyer was pre-approved with a VA loan. Since we had no experience with selling, we did not know (once under contract) that we would be responsible for repairing all Section 1 and Section 2 pest / dry rot / termite. No termites at the house, but we were forced to pay several thousand dollars in dry rot work. We would not have had to do this if the buyer did not have a VA loan because it would not have been a loan contingency. In addition, and something we were not aware of. The VA chooses their own bank of pre-approved appraisers (government approved appraisers). These appraisers are chosen for a reason. They can appraise your home for low market value and subsequently devalue your homes market value. Even with local comps coming in thousands of dollars higher. This was a nightmare for us. Since we did not know this, we had chosen a home already and needed to move. We did not have the flexibility to begin the process all over again. Thirdly, accepting a contract from someone who intends on buying a property with a VA takes an extraordinary amount of time to close. It took more than 45 days to close which also cost us additional money. All in all, not a good experience. Home Bay suggested using their Title company for closing. Not a good idea. We were constantly chasing the title company down to furnish necessary docs for closing. They would promise to get it right and fail 95% of the time. Home Bay's title company is an affiliate of Home Bay (which we also did not know upfront). In addition, Murphy's Law says this will happen. Our Home Bay representative was often difficult to get on the phone the first time we would call. He would call us back (which was ok), however, in many instances, it was critical that the rep be available. Of course the rep has regular days off. They say anyone at Home Bay will be able to assist. Not entirely true. Your rep is privy to all of your individual circumstances. If assisted by any other person, you will have to explain everything again (hoping the new rep will completely understand what's going on). It can get very frustrating. Especially when your rep is not available on two consecutive days off. Showing your own home can pose a few challenges too. Luckily we were available most of the time to show our home. We have animals, so it would have been difficult to let folks into our residence without taking that into consideration. You either need to be immediately available or put a lock box on your home. "The agents have to give you notice". Initially Home Bay said at least 12 hrs notice. But reality is, buyers agents will call and provide literal minutes notice. You better be ready. All-in-all, this process stressed us out in a huge way. Home Bay did not tell us upfront why we may want to pass on a buyer with a VA loan, did not inform us of reasons why we may want to do that, what costs we could potentially incur, were slow getting back to us at critical times, and in essence, WE sold our house and essentially paid Home Bay for providing closing docs. Looking back, we should have hired our own agent. A good agent is available and responsive. A great agent is usually available after 5:00pm and reachable 7 days a week. An experienced agent would have had knowledge about the types of loans (and consequences) and we believe the transaction would have gone much more smoothly and cost us less money.

It is way ti difficult to find anyone to answer questions, and NEVER on a WEEKEND. It coast me a sale.

I saved a lot of money but their service is pretty poor. You are basically left on your own with very little guidance.

You have an agent adogned to you but if that person isn't available you have to talk to someone else. I just felt like I had to do to much keeping track of things.

Lousy website. It was obviously not even in beta mode. Would not use again. Wouldn’t recommend for first time sellers.

The sale of my house with Homebay went well. My agent or others were available to answer questions and steer me in the right direction. The only negative was that they were not familiar with this market-I was the first listing in this area and it took a few weeks to be able to be listed on the local MLS. Once this was rectified, things went smoothly. My purchase experience with Homebay of a condo has been less than satisfactory. I feel that my agent was more focused on closing the sale than addressing my concerns over condition of the property. I feel I had to pay market price for a property that was cosmetically marginal and hiding many issues. An energy consultant has come out and confirmed I need to replace all 11 windows due to leaks. I have had multiple plumbing calls for the only shower, the gas stove still does not function properly and will require a service call. My agent refused to negotiate a professional clean of the property despite multiple requests so I moved into a grime encrusted kitchen that required a through scrubbing before anything could be placed in the room. It is now more than 2 months past the date of close and I have not yet received my rebate per contract of half of the commission for the sale. If it were not for this rebate, I never would have agreed to the sales price, which I thought was too high given the condition. The first check was sent to the physical address which was not my mailing address (mailing address was provided). That check was cancelled and re-issued, but has never arrived. We arranged a timeline for an overnight check which was not adhered to. My agent was obviously frustrated by the system not working, but has not been overly helpful in resolving the issue. At this point I am contemplating legal action as I do not see any other remedies.