Has anyone had a motivated seller go cold between the first call and the second?

Three days is probably where it slipped, and here is why that window is so dangerous. The first call caught him in a moment of clarity about his problem. By the time you called back, his daughter had given him a competing frame, which was "this thing is an income stream" rather than "this thing is a burden." Once a seller has an alternative story in his head, your original price anchor has to fight that story instead of just his own discomfort.

The thing I would watch for is that motivated sellers are often motivated by a feeling more than a fact. The feeling fades. Three days is enough time for a daughter, a neighbor, a Zillow estimate, or just a decent night's sleep to replace the feeling with a different one.

What you are already doing, locking in the next call before you hang up the first one, is the right adjustment. Something like "I'll have some numbers together by Thursday morning, can we talk at ten?" Turns a vague follow-up into a commitment he has said yes to out loud. That matters.

I would also say that what actually changed is probably always going to be partly a guess. You can identify the likely cause, daughter's involvement, a competing call, time to second-guess, but you rarely get to know for certain. What you can control is shortening the window and creating a clear next step while his urgency is still live.

One question worth asking yourself: did you name his specific problem back to him on that first call, the actual burden of a vacant fourplex, or did you move mostly into the numbers? That sometimes makes the difference in whether he feels heard enough to stay in the conversation.

What does your current gap look like between first contact and first formal offer?