Breakaway Books

Authored by Marisa Kashino; Published November 2025; Thriller

⭐️⭐️⭐️ / 🏖️

If you have a nightmare househunting experience in your past or your near future, you should skip right past Best Offer Wins. No one would (or should) take their desire for a house quite as far as the heroine of this novel does, but her anxiety over purchasing the perfect house brought back the high cortisol levels of my own real estate purchase process.

In Best Offer Wins, Margo is desperate to escape the one-bedroom apartment she shares with her husband in Washington, DC, but in the post-pandemic world, the real estate market is beyond belief. Consistently beaten out by all-cash offers hundreds of thousands of dollars over asking price, Margo is absolutely determined to get her dream house in Bethesda. Soon, Margo’s determination starts to feel a lot more like obsession, and it becomes obvious that she is willing to go way further than even her husband thinks she will.

I wonder just how wildly unrealistic this novel seems to most people around the world, and even most Americans. The mania to which Margo is driven by being unable to find and purchase the place of her dreams comes across as over the top, and the way that the author describes the market conditions may seem like pure fiction. As a woman who has tried to purchase a home in the Washington, DC area, I can assure you that the market conditions are not exaggerated; I understood some elements of Margo’s frustration. But, for the same reasons, from page one, this novel stressed me out. It brought back my conviction that I would never be able to buy a home and panic at the insane amount of competition in the market. Pile on top of that the fact that Margo’s internal monologue is unquestionably toxic, and at times, I felt positively nauseous reading this book. Margo is the queen of spiraling: Her mind immediately jumps from not being able to buy this particular house in Bethesda to having no family, to having no life, and to having no happiness. Perhaps because of these insane leaps and the pressure they put on Margo, she’s also, frankly, mean, to every single person in her life–husband, friends, boss–who presents an obstacle to the purchase of the house, and it felt a little gross to experience it beside her.

All of that being said, if you haven’t yet experienced any real estate nightmares, the novel could actually be quite a fun thriller. Margo’s completely crazy actions won’t make you sweat if you’re not currently trying to buy a house in a high cost of living area, and you can just shake your head at how unrealistic it would be for Margo to stalk the owners of her dream house. The author really nails Margo’s voice and her slow escalation from “stressed about the house” to “obsessed with the house” to “probably clinically insane because of the house.” The progression is almost certainly the most impressive and well-executed element of the whole novel; other parts feel like a little too much, especially her husband’s affair with a twenty-something environmental justice volunteer.

Best Offer Wins might be a little too disturbing if you’re an aspiring suburbanite house owner. For everyone else, you’ll probably enjoy the ride!