Trade-up: A Growing Family’s Clear Path to a New Centra Home

October 9th, 2019

Coordinating the purchase of a new home with the sale of your existing house can be stressful and time-consuming. Centra Homes new Trade-up Program helped one growing family navigate the challenges unscathed.

As the Knauer family was getting closer to increasing in number from three to four, the decision to move to a new home was an obvious one. However, Adam Knauer shares that the path to get there was decidedly less clear. 

He says that the prospect of a listing, sale and move was complicated by several factors. The family had a baby on a strict schedule, another on the way and a dog to kennel for showings. 

Because of this, keeping a clean house and being responsive to showing requests presented an issue. In addition, Knauer says that the prospect of coordinating the timing of his new purchase with the sale of his existing Crystal home seemed daunting. He was concerned his family would have to move twice.

Nonetheless the family stepped into the process, attending showings and searching online for a new home. It was only after they found a few homes that fit the bill that their challenges re-emerged. They tried several solutions but none seemed to work.  

The family:

• Submitted a contingent offer on a home only to have it rejected due to the contingency
•  Considered a short term rental but found the $2,500/month price tag untenable
• Looked into a storage unit but struggled with the logistics of a double move

It was only after the family ran the gauntlet of other options that Knauer found a lifeline. While searching for a home on the Centra Homes website he happened upon a link to Centra’s new “Trade-up” program. A program designed for buyers just like the Knauers. 

Centra Trade-up Program

Through the program, Centra Homes helps buyers of homes in their communities by offering a cash offer for their existing home. If the offer is accepted and a purchase contract on a new home secured, closing on the sales occur in one meeting. Following the close, buyers have five days to move. For the Knauers that meant:

• no showings
• no moving twice and
• none of the stress of worrying about timing

It sounded almost too good to be true to Knauer. But his interest in Centra’s Karston Cove community in Albertville combined with his frustration with his experiences to date encouraged him to give it a try. 

So the Knauers met with a sales consultant to define the specifics around a prospective new home in Karston Cove. Following that meeting a sales consultant stopped over to assess their existing home and pull together an offer. That process took about one week.

“We were nervous the offer would be twenty thousand dollars below market, but Tammy [from Centra] assured us that they’re not in this to take a large profit selling our current home. They do this to simplify selling the new home.”

 –  Adam Knauer, Homebuyer

Knauer says the offer came in and was about two thousand dollars below what he thought his home would list for. The Knauer family was elated. They agreed to move forward in the process and Centra even shared the listing price they planned to use.   

Finally achieving clarity around an approach, the family scheduled an aggressive close 30 days out for both homes. Knauer says that the back-to-back closings took a total of 45 minutes.  

He is full of praise for the entire experience and especially appreciative that his family had five days to move to their new home. “It was fantastic working with Tammy and team.” says Knauer, “The entire thing was stress-free and the Centra team was super communicative throughout.” 

As for the new Centra home in Albertville, Knauer has nothing but positives to share there as well. He notes that while his previous home was a new construction home, it is already clear that the quality of his Centra home is a step up and his family is loving it.  

“Our next house will probably be another Centra home. I hope the trade-up program is still around.”

–  Adam Knauer, Homebuyer

Trade-Up Details

If the idea of a stress-free path to a new Centra Home appeals to you, additional information about the Trade-up Program is available on Centra’s website. This includes a frequently asked questions section, a sample timeline and details about Centra’s active selling communities.

 To get started, interested buyers should contact a Sales Counselor for the Centra community that interests them.  

 “We are delighted we were able to help the Knauers navigate the path to their new home and excited about the future of this program .”

— Tammy Brown, Centra Homes Vice President of Sales and Marketing