To those selling in these difficult times Part Deux. AKA sellers support network!

Blodwen

Well done on making a brave decision Twyllyd, can't have been easy. The thought of having to drop quite a bit scares me but if that's the way the market is, then so be it. Hopefully you won't lose out though, as you say, if the place you buy goes the same way.

azkaban420

rosered100 wrote: »

When we bought our house years ago it had been on the market for £365k for about a year. The vendors (a couple in their 80's who were going their separate ways & wanted one last big blow out) decided to sell it themselves & dropped the price to £280k with an advert in the Sunday Times. I saw the ad & it was out of our price range but I cut it out & kept it as my dream house & something to aim for.
It made us start looking in this area & about 6 months later DH was driving past & the old man was in the garden so he stopped & asked if it was still for sale but it was well over our budget of £220k. He said ok, come & look & eventually we got it for that. We were absolutely stretched, every visa card full up etc & couldnt even afford furniture or curtains for a couple of years but we did get our dream house.

Next door were furious as they had their house on the market still at £365k & they didnt end up selling for another 3 years (almost 5 years in total on the market) as they refused to drop at all.

So you can & should look above your budget but it all depends on peoples circumstances & I think the market still has a long way to fall, remembering the years of doldrums last time.

That's why I'm so fed up with our buyer dropping out when we were meant to exchange this week. I've a feeling that we've missed the boat & we're making plans to rent it out now as we have to be in another county for September schools. Cant afford to pay a mortgage on an empty house & rent to someone else, so all our hard work getting it tip top will probably need redoing after the renters have been in.:(

Hi rosared, I totally get what you mean, you had your eye on a house above your budget for a while, and when you had the right opportunity, it worked for you. I guess I mean that in the current situation I'm in, unless I know the history of a house being on the market for a long time, I won't book a viewing for something too over budget. If a house is new on the market, it's pointless going to see it if it's £50k over my budget....if it's still there a year on, that's a different ball game altogether

Gutting about your buyer pulling out before exchange, this is my biggest fear, as we're in a similar boat and are moving to a new area 45 mins away, so trying to get schools sorted and moved before September. If the sale falls apart, we'll have to stay put and re-assess our options.

Good luck,

Az

Orpheo

This is an interesting thread and I wish you all well with the sales of your houses.

Forgive me this though. There are a number of references in this thread to "tyre kickers" (I understand the term) and for the most part it seems that sellers define "tyre kickers" as someone who views your property and decides that it is not suitable for them. Granted, if someone with kids views a studio flat then he or she is either desperate or a numpty, but if someone views a property and decides that it is too big, too small, too pink, too magnolia, too new, too old or whatever, then that should be perfectly fine. In all likelihood they are about to borrow a silly amount of money, they should be as fussy as they please.

I'm viewing houses with my wife at the moment and at our leisure. Quite often the particulars that attract the viewing are misleading. There is often imaginative photography or dimensions that have been measured into a narrow alcove giving a false impression of the size of a room. Sometimes the fish and chip shop next door is entirely unexpected. Sometimes the go-cart hanging in the hallway (really!) can be a dreadful first impression. Sometimes the bulges in the wallpaper or the foam tiles on the ceiling (classy) make you wonder what nasty surprises have been papered over. When this happens and we decide that the house isn't suitable for us then we obviously don't want to buy it. Thank you for taking the time to show us around your house though.

Blodwen

Hi Orpheo,

I kind of agree with you - I have seen a few houses as a buyer and thought either as soon as I walk through the front door or after seeing particular things I don't like that 'this isn't the house for me'. That's fine and as you say it's perfectly acceptable not to spend hundreds of thousands on something you're not sure about. The point is though that if it was the right house and the price was right, you or I would buy it.

However, when I've read the threads about 'tyre kickers' I've read it to mean people who come and look around when they have no intention of buying (at least at that time), they're there for some other reason such as to work out what you get for your money in a certain area, compare to something else they've seen but weren't sure about, or just to have a nosy round. Essentially, even if it 'ticked all the boxes' (hate that phrase!) and they liked it they still wouldn't be putting an offer in. It's a fine line at times as some might say that looking round when you're not yet in a position to proceed (i.e. me as I haven't sold yet) is classed as wasting time, but I intend to buy a house, potentially almost any of the ones I've viewed, as soon as I am able, which I would hope would be soon.

azkaban420

Orpheo wrote: »

This is an interesting thread and I wish you all well with the sales of your houses.

Forgive me this though. There are a number of references in this thread to "tyre kickers" (I understand the term) and for the most part it seems that sellers define "tyre kickers" as someone who views your property and decides that it is not suitable for them. Granted, if someone with kids views a studio flat then he or she is either desperate or a numpty, but if someone views a property and decides that it is too big, too small, too pink, too magnolia, too new, too old or whatever, then that should be perfectly fine. In all likelihood they are about to borrow a silly amount of money, they should be as fussy as they please.

I'm viewing houses with my wife at the moment and at our leisure. Quite often the particulars that attract the viewing are misleading. There is often imaginative photography or dimensions that have been measured into a narrow alcove giving a false impression of the size of a room. Sometimes the fish and chip shop next door is entirely unexpected. Sometimes the go-cart hanging in the hallway (really!) can be a dreadful first impression. Sometimes the bulges in the wallpaper or the foam tiles on the ceiling (classy) make you wonder what nasty surprises have been papered over. When this happens and we decide that the house isn't suitable for us then we obviously don't want to buy it. Thank you for taking the time to show us around your house though.

Hi there, welcome to the thread, and thanks for your post. For me, the tyre-kickers are those who have been specifically told by the EA (at our request) that there is no specific on-street parking for my house, and to make parking would be extremely difficult/time-consuming/costly, if at all possible. The available on-street parking is further away. Then they come and see the house, and say, lovely house but we don't like the fact that there's no parking!!! I've heard that so many times when we initially accepted anyone to view, then I had to ask the EA to let people know that this was the case with the parking. I STILL had so many viewings where people would come and still say 'didn't realise there was no parking'. :mad:

That's my personal bug-bear anyway. I know full well that everyone coming may not want to buy my house, but I don't like spending hours cleaning up the house for someone who decided to see the house for the heck of it, on the back of several other houses, clearly with no intention to buy. That is time-wasting IMHO.

Az

Sphynx

Grrrrr and double Grrrrrr. I spent AGES getting the relevant documentation to put forward for our mortgage application (proof of pension, wage slips etc) and have had a letter from the bank today saying "we don't have your wage slips for May of April" :mad:

Such a load of rubbish they were DEFINITELY with the application and I handed it into the branch so it hasn't gone mysteriously 'missing ' in the post. I got quite annoyed with the woman on the phone because I was asking her where the original documents were and she kept saying she was looking at them on the system. BUT WHERE ARE THE ORIGINALS?????? AAGGGGHHH!!!

So eventually she cottoned on to what I was asking her and she said the originals were with the scanning dept. I asked her (quite nicely considering) to get in touch with them and make them check. She would phone me back. Amazingly she did phone me back and said she would put in a request for the scanning dept to check the originals....

I suppose I should have photocopied the whole lot, but nowhere seems to have a photocopier nowadays and I daren't use the one at work as can't afford to get sacked. Sooooooooooo annoyed!!

Right vent over thanks

Orpheo

Azkaban. Can you be sure that the EA is actually passing this information on to the potential viewers? I think it is very likely that they are knowingly not doing so. The EA will probably have data capture targets, targets for the number of viewings they conduct and so on.

Whenever I ask questions of an EA before viewing a property they never answer them. Their response is either ignorant of the property, cagey or they outright say "we don't have that information". Similarly, when I have attended viewings conducted by the EA they generally refuse to answer questions, whether through ignorance or simply to cover their own behind and instead bombard us with emotive and leading questions such as, "it's lovely isn't it?" Talk about leading with the chin.

azkaban420

Sphynx wrote: »

Grrrrr and double Grrrrrr. I spent AGES getting the relevant documentation to put forward for our mortgage application (proof of pension, wage slips etc) and have had a letter from the bank today saying "we don't have your wage slips for May of April" :mad:

Such a load of rubbish they were DEFINITELY with the application and I handed it into the branch so it hasn't gone mysteriously 'missing ' in the post. I got quite annoyed with the woman on the phone because I was asking her where the original documents were and she kept saying she was looking at them on the system. BUT WHERE ARE THE ORIGINALS?????? AAGGGGHHH!!!

So eventually she cottoned on to what I was asking her and she said the originals were with the scanning dept. I asked her (quite nicely considering) to get in touch with them and make them check. She would phone me back. Amazingly she did phone me back and said she would put in a request for the scanning dept to check the originals....

I suppose I should have photocopied the whole lot, but nowhere seems to have a photocopier nowadays and I daren't use the one at work as can't afford to get sacked. Sooooooooooo annoyed!!

Right vent over thanks

We had that with our last purchase, sometimes had to send stuff three times for it to be accepted, you'd think they were handling such important docs that they'd look after them but pffft...

Hopefully the scanning dept can find your docs, if not can you get duplicates from work?

Az

sonastin

Orpheo wrote: »

This is an interesting thread and I wish you all well with the sales of your houses.

Forgive me this though. There are a number of references in this thread to "tyre kickers" (I understand the term) and for the most part it seems that sellers define "tyre kickers" as someone who views your property and decides that it is not suitable for them. Granted, if someone with kids views a studio flat then he or she is either desperate or a numpty, but if someone views a property and decides that it is too big, too small, too pink, too magnolia, too new, too old or whatever, then that should be perfectly fine. In all likelihood they are about to borrow a silly amount of money, they should be as fussy as they please.

I'm viewing houses with my wife at the moment and at our leisure. Quite often the particulars that attract the viewing are misleading. There is often imaginative photography or dimensions that have been measured into a narrow alcove giving a false impression of the size of a room. Sometimes the fish and chip shop next door is entirely unexpected. Sometimes the go-cart hanging in the hallway (really!) can be a dreadful first impression. Sometimes the bulges in the wallpaper or the foam tiles on the ceiling (classy) make you wonder what nasty surprises have been papered over. When this happens and we decide that the house isn't suitable for us then we obviously don't want to buy it. Thank you for taking the time to show us around your house though.

For me tyre-kickers are the following:
1) People who need to sell their house first, but haven't yet put it on the market, and aren't yet in the process of doing the things it needs to have done to it to be able to put it on the market. Its one thing to not be in a position to proceed yet, but please be actively trying to get yourself into that position before you start viewing properties!

2) People who have nothing like enough money to buy it, or haven't got a clue how much money they are likely to be able to borrow. I don't mind people who's budget is a bit below the asking price but when its waaaaaaaaaaaaay below :mad:. And to start viewing before you know if the banks will even consider you? :mad::mad:

3) People whose negative feedback entirely revolves around information that is clearly in the details - such as Az's parking issue.

4) People who give reasons for not buying it that are so spurious that either they are dreaming that the perfect house exists in move-in condition exactly how they want it, or they were never intending to buy and had to find something to pick on to justify it. (I'm thinking here of the couple who wouldn't buy because the bedroom was painted pink and they were having a boy! :cool:)

Coming along and finding it wasn't what you expected, after checking the details properly doesn't bother me. Nor does checking out what you can get once you sell if you are trying to sell. Nor does hoping that the vendor will come down in price a bit too much. Those people aren't tyre kickers to me, just frustrating because I want someone to by my bleedin' house!!!

Orpheo

EAs appear to me to be part of the problem. They exist only due to the inability of two parties, the buyer and seller, to get together, communicate and negotiate in good faith.

They are descended from the Golgafrinchans.