Repossessed Property Buying: Quick Briefing Discussion

Ankatden

As its a repo involving a lender then any change in the price post agreement may give them the idea you have no intention of completing and they may put back on the market.

Unlike a normal vendor Lenders do play hardball well.

kinnth

The property has never left the market and was advertised in the local paper for £110,500 and they received no offers. I would assume that if they accepted the 105,000 offer they would put the house back in the local paper again at the revised 105,000 price.

Do you think it is worth playing hardball then?

FelinePrincess

Hi, can anyone give me any advice.

I am planning to put an offer mid next week (it will take me till then to get the money together) on a repo flat on the market for 35k, reduced from 45k. It is cash only as people have tried and failed to get a mortgage due to no management company. When I spoke to the ea on friday he said they have a cash offer of 35k and a mortgage offer of 36.5k. 2 other flats in the building were recently sold for around 40k, one of which was at auction.

Now, I know if a bidding war is going to happen there is nothing really that can be done to stop it but I wonder if anyone has any advice for me? I really want this flat but money is tight and we are having to borrow from both me and my partners families to get the money together for it so if anyone has any advice on how best to handle a potential bidding war it would be very much appreciated.

Also, if our offer is accepted we would want to try and get things moving quickly to allow less time to get gazumped.. I understand alot of this will be dependant on the solicitor and the seller but when should I get a solicitor involved? Should I get one before we place an offer or wait to see if our offer is accepted? Sorry if this seems like a stupid question but this is all new to me!

GDB2222

Put the offer in and get it accepted before instructing a solicitor. If you are a cash buyer, you could consider buying at auction if another one comes up. It sounds as though a bidding war on this one could drive it up to near 40k, anyway.

The best way to avoid a bidding war is to go in a fair bit higher than the other cash offer. (Forget the offer that's dependent on a mortgage.) If that is £35k and you offer £35.5, they'll come back again at £36k, and so on tit for tat. If you go in at say £38k the other buyers are more likely just to give up.

Doozergirl

FelinePrincess wrote: »

Hi, can anyone give me any advice.

I am planning to put an offer mid next week (it will take me till then to get the money together) on a repo flat on the market for 35k, reduced from 45k. It is cash only as people have tried and failed to get a mortgage due to no management company. When I spoke to the ea on friday he said they have a cash offer of 35k and a mortgage offer of 36.5k. 2 other flats in the building were recently sold for around 40k, one of which was at auction.

Now, I know if a bidding war is going to happen there is nothing really that can be done to stop it but I wonder if anyone has any advice for me? I really want this flat but money is tight and we are having to borrow from both me and my partners families to get the money together for it so if anyone has any advice on how best to handle a potential bidding war it would be very much appreciated.

Also, if our offer is accepted we would want to try and get things moving quickly to allow less time to get gazumped.. I understand alot of this will be dependant on the solicitor and the seller but when should I get a solicitor involved? Should I get one before we place an offer or wait to see if our offer is accepted? Sorry if this seems like a stupid question but this is all new to me!

I'm really worried about this for you. You do understand how serious it is that the property is unmortgageable and other flats are going to auction?

Repairs will not be easy to come by and proportionately expensive - if you have to carry out work yourself when the neighbours aren't interested because they're investors renting them out to anyone that will take them; when something is that cheap you can't add value through improvements but as long as you understand that it is a risk and that to sell it you might be putting it back into auction.

I'd speak to a solicitor now and let them know that you are looking at it and give them an idea of the issues - that if you have an offer accepted you will need as much due diligence on the lease and management doing in a short space of time; plus initial advice on how and whether to proceed before you pay out for searches etc.

I think the issues have been downplayed by people on your other thread. Nobody being able to raise a mortgage on a property is a very big deal indeed.

I think people have underplayed issues

Doozergirl

GDB2222 wrote: »

Put the offer in and get it accepted before instructing a solicitor. If you are a cash buyer, you could consider buying at auction if another one comes up. It sounds as though a bidding war on this one could drive it up to near 40k, anyway.

The best way to avoid a bidding war is to go in a fair bit higher than the other cash offer. (Forget the offer that's dependent on a mortgage.) If that is £35k and you offer £35.5, they'll come back again at £36k, and so on tit for tat. If you go in at say £38k the other buyers are more likely just to give up.

But that is nearly 10% over the other offer. I'm not sure I'd go for the 'knock out' option on something that cheap.

GDB2222

Doozergirl wrote: »

But that is nearly 10% over the other offer. I'm not sure I'd go for the 'knock out' option on something that cheap.

I agree, but OTOH it's still £2k under the auction price.

BTW, I totally agree that this is going to be a heap of trouble. I wonder why the leaseholders can't get together to take over the management? That's the real question. If as you say it's just landlords, they would still be interested in increasing the values and making the properties mortgageable effectively for nothing. They need, iirc, over 50% of the flats to participate, and the legal fees would be peanuts when split a few ways if there's nobody opposing the application.

silence12

Hi its from the date the solicitor receives the contracts.

dan10000 wrote: »

Hi
Well done on your purchase! Could you tell me from what point the 28 days starts? Is it from the date of offer acceptance, advert in the paper or what?

Many thanks
Daniel.

wannaberich41

Hi
Ive come a cross a repo and when i called the agent on the weekend, they advised that they had only had it on about 6 weeks but it had been on with another agent previously she said about 1 year. The new agent has knocked about 10k off the asking price. Ive looked at prices of other properties around the same area and feel that it is over priced for what and where it is. I can only guess that it is the bank trying to get as much as they can back. How much below the asking price can you offer on a repo? Can you put in a offer before you have sold your own?

The fascias are rotten on the house and garage and looks like 2 doors would need replacing. All the windows are wood and the conservatory ds wood and are looking a bit sorry. The garden looks like a jungle.
Thanks in advance.

GDB2222

Probably no chance if you haven't sold your own.