Before you help them offer

A short checklist for the parent who is helping, written for the week before an offer. None of it needs you to know the suburb, and none of it tells you what the offer should be; it tells you where the evidence is, so the family is arguing about facts rather than feelings. Every item can be done from a phone.

The three checks

1. Check what it last sold for, and when. It is on the public record. The price paid and the time held commonly say more about the vendor's position than the campaign does: a vendor who bought recently often has costs to recover, while one who has held for decades may have more room than the guide shows. The state land registry holds the record, and listing portals commonly show a sales history.
2. Check how long it has been on the market, and what the price has done. The first listing date, any relisting, any price change, and whether it has been withdrawn before. A long campaign in a fast market, or a "new price", each says something the photos do not. The campaign's wording and its price format are on the listing itself.
3. Check what recorded sales of comparable homes support. The price guide is the agent's figure, set for the vendor; in some states it is regulated, in most it is not (what "offers over" means in your state). The comparables are the evidence. Agents can be asked which recorded sales the guide rests on.

What reaches the vendor

4. Budget, pre-approval and deadlines. The agent acts for the vendor, and what is said at an open home about a budget, a pre-approval amount or a deadline commonly reaches the vendor, because passing it on is part of the agent's job.

Who answers the other questions

5. The money questions. How a gift affects the age pension, what going guarantor puts at risk, how to treat the other children and what happens if the couple separates are each questions for a licensed financial adviser, a lawyer or Centrelink, asked before the offer, not after.

Before Saturday

6. The three checks on paper. Families commonly write down the last sale, the listing's history and the comparable sales before the open home and share them between generations, so any walk-away number is settled away from the campaign rather than after the offer.