An Example of a Lack of "Good" Buyers

westv

Tassotti wrote: »

You came on here asking about trying to 'sell your house'.

Did I? In this thread? Where exactly did I ask that?

ginvzt

We sold our house. Have a decent deposit in the bank. If we find a 4-bed detached in the are we like, we are going to buy it. Just not for the £250 or more. It has to come down. We lost a house we fell in love that was at £210 and went for that price. The vendor did not want a biding war and both interested parties had a chance to improve the offer after which he made a decision. What I am trying to say is that houses for reasonable price do sell. Hard to decide what is reasonable price in this market though... I know of a road where the same design of house has asking price from £190k to £230k. All have the similar sized gardens, and probably the cheapest has best potential as it has new kitchen, conservatory and still the garden about the same size as others! Guess, which one buyers would prefer? Pity, we don't like the area - too close to motorway for our taste!

dander

I think it's a great question to ask an estate agent - that kind of info helps keep you sane when you are wondering why you can't sell.

What makes it even rougher is if you think that's people the estate agent *thinks* are matches, when in reality a good chunk of them will have their own personal reasons why yours isn't the kind of house they're looking for. You know, wrong kind of architecture, not the kind of layout they're after, etc, so your pool of potential buyers is actually even smaller than that. Tough times.

PasturesNew

I've sold my house. Sat on a big wedge. There's no way I'd want a 4-bed house. Too many rooms I'd never go in. Higher council tax band. More maintenance. More insurance. More heating. No thanks.

vicky_kidder

westv wrote: »

What are you talking about? I know what you're trying to do but I'm one fish you're not going to reel in.

I don't quite understand how you've taken what the poster was saying but to me it sounded like they were trying to give you advice on selling your house which, admittedly, you have not explictly stated, b ut you did say about the estate agents marketing your house with obviously implies that it is 'on the market'.

Fuchsia_a

bo_drinker wrote: »

It is frustrating but the agents should be telling folk to come back when they have sold or welcome cash buyers.

I'm a cash buyer (with my parents around here, though I would be on my own somewhere cheaper!) and agents treat me appallingly badly, and did the last time we bought a house, too - they're frequently late or don't turn up to viewings, and pretty much ignore everything I ask them. They also don't let buyers in to view houses that the EA's friends are interested in - I've had some EAs being incredibly blatant about it and listing off reels of reasons not to go and see somewhere several times. :rolleyes:

I don't think EAs believe that you can be young and be a cash buyer unless you're flashing loads of bling. Generally they lose all interest in me when I tell them I don't need them to fix me up with a mortgage - either that's where they make the real money or they're overly suspicious and don't believe me.

westv

vicky_kidder wrote: »

I don't quite understand how you've taken what the poster was saying but to me it sounded like they were trying to give you advice on selling your house which, admittedly, you have not explictly stated, b ut you did say about the estate agents marketing your house with obviously implies that it is 'on the market'.

Hi Vicky. As I explained in my fourth post in the thread my reason for starting this thread was to show figures for one area of the country as regards to how few "sold" buyers there are compared to last year. I only really brought up the neighbour as an aside. The thread wasn't intended to be specifically about my sale but sales in general so when Tassotti made the first reply I was confused as to it's relevance to the subject raised. Hence when Tassotti suggested I was wasting people's time I assumed (wrongly?) he was trying to wind me up. Does that make things clearer?

frank.hopper

vicky_kidder wrote: »

I don't quite understand how you've taken what the poster was saying but to me it sounded like they were trying to give you advice on selling your house which, admittedly, you have not explictly stated, b ut you did say about the estate agents marketing your house with obviously implies that it is 'on the market'.

The poster wasen't looking for advice! merely quoting how the market had changed.

Whilst he was on the line I asked him how many people he had on his books looking who had sold their own property. He said that of 60 clients that matched my property 15 had sold. He went on to say that this time last year it would have been more likely to be 95 matched and 60 sold.

wymondham

Visiting houses you have no intention of buying is quite a popular Sunday afternoon pass-time for many I suspect! I know when we were looking to buy our current place, we visited far more than we needed to, and ones which we had no intention, or indeed could afford - you just get nosey I suppose!

As buyers dry up, estate agents won't be vetting buyers circumstances as much as before - they just want to get people in so sellers can see some sort of progress?

kingkano

bo_drinker wrote: »

Largest percentage that have looked at our house have been a waste of time in as much as they had not sold their place first. There are a lot of timewasters about. Your bloke from over the road is probably thinking of selling his place and looking at yours to see if he thinks his is worth the same. It is frustrating but the agents should be telling folk to come back when they have sold or welcome cash buyers.

I personally think thats a bit blinkered. While they shouldn't be making offers, they should definitely be viewing places once they are on the market.

The alternative would be waiting until their under offer and keeping their buyer hanging for months while they find a place, the person they buy off then finds a place etc etc.

When I was trading up last year I was a bit naive and had an offer accepted by somebody just like this. 3 months later they called the sale off saying they had discovered they couldnt get the type of property they wanted at the price they wanted to pay. Basically they had decided to sell without doing any viewings or conducting much research.