Offering on a house before I have sold mine?

rob_mclellan

Hi, is it possible to make an offer on a property before I sell my current home? We will need the house to be sold to finance the new one?

Is this common? It's just that we are in the process of putting our existing home on the Market, and have seen the house we want to buy already, and it's likely to be snapped up pretty quick....

We have met the vendors and have built up a good rappot with them, with them giving us their number we want to view again or any questions rather than going through the EA.

Any advice appreciated.

lelole

Hi,

As far as I know there is nothing to stop you making an offer to register interest, but to be honest until you have sold there is not much point. I cannot imagine somebody who is selling accepting the offer over and above someone who offers and can proceed so why bother?

Sorry, I know it's frustrating and we had the exact same situation and the one we wanted DID sell - less than a week before we did, and we are still trying to find one we want...it's pants, but just the way it is...

Leah

Ian_W

Can't see any vendor accepting an offer unless and until your house is at least verifiably "under offer". You're simply what Estate Agents would term "not proceedable".

In the current market your property may take anything from a few days to many months to sell. Until it does you don't have the money to buy so no matter how well you get on with the seller - they'd be barking to take you seriously. A cash buyer or someone who has sold may be their next viewer.

PasturesNew

There's no point making an offer until yours is sold. Until you have a buyer you don't know if/when or for how much yours will be sold. No seller will take your offer seriously until you are in a position to proceed.

ognum

Certainly make the offer but how do you know what you can afford, when you can buy or even if you wll seel you home.
As a seller I would say thanks, Im glad you are interested but IM afraid my home will stay on the market until you have the means to pay.
Of course they are friendly and you have a good rappour, how does it hurt them to be friendly you may be their buyer, then again you may not!

Cannon_Fodder

I don't see anything wrong with expressing your interest through an offer.

If there's a low proceedable offer versus your non-proceedable higher offer, then its up to the vendor to make that call.

Your offer at least gives them feedback that the price you are prepared to offer is achievable.

It might also be the case, that they have yet to find somewhere, so are happy to allow some time for yours to sell while they are looking...

Until they get an offer how can they know what they might afford - applies all the way up the chain - someones got to start the ball rolling...

MRSTITTLEMOUSE

We accepted four offers from people who had not yet sold on condition we kept our house on the market and that the house would be sold to whoever could proceed first.
We kept in touch every week with updates.
It turned out though we had someone from out of the area,able to proceed as they'd already sold and were having to move out in a few weeks so the other four buyers lost out.
No harm in offering but be prepared for disappointment.
Put yourself in the vendors shoes and you can understand why.

chickmug

There is no reason why you shouldn’t try and offer before you are proceedable (sold with complete chain formed) but in most cases the EA and/or seller would point out that there is no benefit in them even considering your offer. No benefit, for them, as the time will come where you do have a complete chain formed and it may be based on your having accepted a much lower price. So in this scenario the party offering will almost certainly have to make a revised (downwards) offer thus making the idea of ‘provisional’ offers a complete waste of waste of time for the EA and/or seller.

So I would expect an agents and/or sellers position to be thank you for showing so much interest in my home but I would rather wait until you are proceedable and only then can we do a deal. But you should expect the EA to keep you in the picture, once you have expressed serious interest, if any other party is offering.

There is also a whimsical notion that you get on really well with the seller and they will give you time to form a chain. Sometimes the seller is not being objective and agrees to this, often against the agents advice, and after time passing the original party finds a buyer at lower price than they had hoped for and has to revise the offer downwards.

dander

What you can do, though, in cases like this is tell the estate agent selling the house you're interested in that you are interested, choose them to sell your house as well, so they have an incentive to complete the chain and make sure you price your house to sell fast - ie, a bit on the low side. It's not guaranteed to work, but it gives you your best shot.