RPGRogina Property GroupSouthern California Property Advisory
See My Options
A property we actually bought

One House. Three Options. Real Numbers.

Every company in this business will tell you they will show you your options. Here are somebody’s actual options, on an actual house, with the actual figures — including what happened after they decided.

The property

Where
Fullerton, California
The house
3 bed, 2 bath, 1,452 sq ft
Condition when we bought it
The home was in poor condition, with significant clutter consistent with mild hoarding, nonfunctional plumbing in one bathroom, broken window panes, and a persistent odor throughout the interior. The HVAC and electrical systems were dated, and the home had popcorn ceilings.

What the seller could have done

Two of these columns are measured, not estimated. The seller took option 1, so that is what they were paid. We then carried out the option 3 renovation ourselves and sold the finished house, so that price is what it fetched — not a guess about what it might have. Option 2 is the only projection on this page, and it is labelled as one.

01

Sell as-is to us

What happened

No repairs, no cleaning out, no agent, no closing costs. We bought it as it stood.

Sale price
$750,000
Cost of the work
None
Commission and closing
We covered it
Carrying costs
None
What the seller keeps$750,000
Out of their own pocket
Nothing
Time
7–30 days
02

Tidy it up, then list

Projected

Paint, flooring, clearing and disposal, landscaping, touch-ups — enough to photograph well and show without apology.

Sale price
$875,000
Cost of the work
−$33,000
Commission and closing
−$59,500
Carrying costs
−$1,800about 2 months of holding
What the seller keeps$780,700
Out of their own pocket
$33,000
Time
6–8 weeks
03

Renovate, then list

What happened

New kitchen, new bathrooms, new flooring, all new lighting, new doors, new windows, all new landscaping.

Sale price
$1,165,000
Cost of the work
−$246,000
Commission and closing
−$79,220
Carrying costs
−$6,3006 months of holding
What the seller keeps$833,480
Out of their own pocket
$246,000
Time
6+ months

The house

Before and after, same house. The 1,452 square feet did not change — the $246,000 did. Where a wall moved and the two frames no longer match, it says so.

The front of the house

The house from the street before work: overgrown trees hiding the front, dead lawn, a tired white garage door.
Before
The same view after: trees cut back, new lawn, painted brick, a dark garage door and new windows.
After

The kitchen

The same corner, after the wall between the kitchen and living room came out.

The kitchen before: dated cabinets, laminate worktops, a ceiling fan, mismatched black appliances and an ageing fridge, counters covered in belongings.
Before
The kitchen after: a wall removed, an island with a stone worktop and stools, white shaker cabinets, stainless appliances and a range hood.
After

The living room

The living room stripped back: bare concrete floor, brown stucco walls, an original brick fireplace and exposed drywall seams across the ceiling.
Before
The same room finished: pale wood floors, white walls, a tiled fireplace in the same position and the same windows either side of it.
After
Reading the three columns

More Money Is Real. So Is What It Costs.

The seller took the smallest number on the table. On the figures alone that looks like the wrong call, and it was not. Three things the columns say that are easy to miss when you are only reading the bottom row.

Bigger is not automatically better. It is just bigger.
01

More money is real. So is what it costs to get it.

Renovating would have paid this seller $83,480 more than the cash offer. That is not nothing. But it asks them to put up $246,000 of their own money first, wait six months, and carry the risk that something goes wrong or the market moves while the kitchen is in pieces.

02

The middle option earns the most per dollar risked.

Tidying up would have paid about $30,700 more for $33,000 spent — close to doubling the money put in, inside two months. The full renovation needed 7.5× the cash to produce 2.7× the extra return. Bigger is not automatically better, and this is the comparison most sellers never get shown.

03

Why anyone takes the cash offer anyway.

$750,000 in a week or two, none of their own money, nothing to organise, nobody walking through the house, and certainty on the day they need it. For this seller that was worth more than the difference. For somebody else it would not be — and that is the whole point of running the comparison instead of assuming.

What this page is not

Your house, your numbers

We can put this together for your property.

Same three columns, your address, and an honest answer about which one we think fits — including when that answer is not the one that involves us.

See My Options

Rogina Property Group buys property as a principal and is not a real estate brokerage. Listing services, where you want them, are separate: Tyler Rogina · Broker Associate · DRE #01925584 · Compass California, Inc. · DRE #01991628. Commission is negotiable.