FTB - first offer

jamesd

Why not rent and let your landlord suffer the drop in property value, then buy later at a cheaper price?

I've been able to buy for a while now but I'm not about to do it when renting costs less than I save in purchase price by waiting.

ciano125

missaitch wrote: »

There's no way we could buy at auction!

Not with attitude! I've never bought at auction but would certainly consider it if it meant I could pay half what the Homebuy scheme were trying to fleece me for.

missaitch

We don't have enough of a deposit to buy at auction or through the normal routes.

I definitely don't see paying rent as saving money, I'm paying someone else's mortgage (and the monthly costs would be lower if we bought).

I know this flat is overpriced and none of the flats in the same development have sold prices on nethouseprices or houseprice so have no idea whether barrat will budge on the price.

My question is how to reduce the price so it's more in keeping with the current market and value... I am certainly not paying £146,000 for it.

ciano125

missaitch wrote: »

My question is how to reduce the price so it's more in keeping with the current market and value... I am certainly not paying £146,000 for it.

Tell them you'll pay £80k for it, and then walk away.

To be honest though, if you're buying with a mortgage your lender wont value it at any more than £90k anyway, so you wont be able to buy it and they'll be doing you a massive favour.

Why not ask them to show you the comparable sales evidence they are basing their "valuation" on. I bet they wont (cant).

jamesd

missaitch wrote: »

I definitely don't see paying rent as saving money, I'm paying someone else's mortgage

Say you're after a property worth 150k and your rent is 5k. If the price of property falls by 10% in a year you've spent 5k on rent and saved 15k on purchase price, leaving you 10k better off by paying the mortgage of someone else for a year.

Once you buy at the right price then the rent saving goes towards your own mortgage and you start to gain from not paying someone else's mortgage. But only if you buy at the right price, which often means at the right time.

Make a very lowball offer if you want this place now. Time is on your side, not theirs.

missaitch

I've researched similar properties in the area in more detail and the same square footage, same number of bedrooms and bathrooms. They sold for around £120,000 - £135,000 between November and March.
I'm going to use this and the downfall in the market to try and lower the price. If it doesn't work we are going to walk away.

ciano125

Its still too much. I've given you one comparable showing £83k for a two bed flat, why are you so determined to spend so much more than you have to??

19jeni89

hiya

i feel really sorry for you as me and my boyfriend were in the same situation and have been looking around for ages new builds and houses on openmarket but still couldn't afford. we have since found an apartment well coach house with barratt in our area for a really reasonable price and going ahead on the homebuy direct scheme. but if the house is a good price then homebuy is well worth it - however it isnt if you buy a house above the market value. hope barratt budge on that parking space - they reduced our house and my friends apartment so fingers crossed for you! xx

missaitch

Thanks for the reply.

Well it's all stopped for the minute, still waiting to hear back from the financial advisor to check our application to homebuy scheme and then we can offer on the flat.

Barrat don't seem to want to discuss anything until they know we can go ahead

I'm thinking of calling with "this is our offer for the apartment and parking space, all we can afford and you're FA isn't in touch. Don't want to waste any time."

Problem is there are two people in the office and would rather deal with only 1...

Blacksheep1979

Why do you think you have to buy - it's a false idea that's pumped into everyones heads and creates these daft shared ownership weird buy your house schemes and keeps property prices artificially inflated?

If you can't afford an 80k mortgage between the pair of you (meaning you're on less than 15k salary each) there's no way you should be going for a 130-150k house on some part buy/shared ownership scheme.