Love Letters

The state of Oregon has recently banned buyer / seller love letters. These are letters from prospective buyers to sellers telling them their personal story and how much they love the house, in hopes that it will entice the sellers to choose their offer on the basis of an emotional attachment. As a Realtor, I’m torn on the topic so I thought I’d share some open thoughts.

So why did Salem do it? It was well-intentioned legislation aimed at preventing discrimination in housing. The basic fear was that a seller might learn something about a buyer from one of these letters and choose to not sell them the house on that basis, which might be discriminatory against that buyer. It’s a commendable goal, as certainly I want to see everyone able to buy the home of their dreams. The home buying process is hard enough without being unfairly discriminated against! So, the Oregon State Legislature said it was no longer legal for Realtors to share these letters with sellers - sellers needed to look at the merits of the offer alone.

That said, the ink wasn’t even dry and buyer’s agents were calling or texting me telling me how much their buyer’s children were going to love growing up there. How it was close to their place of worship and all the other things that would have formerly been in a letter from the buyers. So it brings up the question - what is a seller love letter? If a buyer’s agent reveals something about their client verbally or in text form - age, race, creed, sexual orientation and so forth - does that constitute the thing the legislature was trying to avoid? A buyer’s name is still on the contract and names often reveal ethnic background, race, and gender, all of which could become an attribute of discrimination. For that matter, if there are two men or two women on a contract, it could be an indication of their sexual orientation. In this era of search engines and social media, it takes almost no effort to learn a person’s complete biography anyway.

So regardless of where you might stand on the idea of love letters, I’m torn on whether this legislation will yield the intended result. For now, Washington has not outright banned these letters, but Realtor associations across the country are recommending against their use as it may open an agent up to legal challenges. What I’ve generally recommended to my buyers is that we should make our offer so solid that the letter isn’t needed, as in this market a good letter isn’t going to make up for a bad offer.