About to make an offer, start at asking price minus 10% ?

Fatboy40

Myself and my family are moving on from our first house as we need something larger, and today I'll be putting an offer in on something that we all like.

It's on at £210,000, has been on the market for quite a few months (it was sold but the buyer pulled out, we believe it was due to the chain collapsing), and is on with three different estate agents (desperate vendor ?).

My gut feeling is that my first offer should be the asking price minus 10%, so I'll be offering £190,000, which I think is ok. The outside of the property (a three bed link detached) is looking a little tired with a drive in need of major attention (rip it up and start again) and a very unloved garden, and the boiler is looking like it doesn't have much life left (luckily my Dad is a plumber).

Is minus 10% a good starting price in general for properties in the current market ?.

Thanks.

Bufger

If you feel cheeky go even lower. I would start at 180-185 and show you're serious and see if they bite, even just a little. Or try and find out what the accepted offer was before and why it fell through. It could be that the lenders survey valued the house a fair bit lower than asking and the buyer pulled out etc. All worth knowing early on.

What area is it in and how much are similar houses in that street going for? It should give you a good indication.

poppysarah

Yes give yourself some wriggle room.
Don't be too emotionally attached you'll negotiate better then.

IveSeenTheLight

Bufger wrote: »

What area is it in and how much are similar houses in that street going for? It should give you a good indication.

Rather than pluck a percentage out of the air, you should as Bufger intimates, try to get some market research for your area.

What have other similar properties sold for?
What is your local market area house price trend (don't go by the UK average as each area is different)?
How many noted interests are there?

Fatboy40

Bufger wrote: »

What area is it in and how much are similar houses in that street going for? It should give you a good indication.

It's in Andover, in north Hampshire.

Unfortunately no house in the road concerned has sold for a while, but at the peak of the market (a couple of years back) they were going for around £250,000.

Fatboy40

Bufger wrote: »

...I would start at 180-185 and show you're serious and see if they bite, even just a little.

Maybe I'm not ruthless enough, offering say 185 I'd feel guilty whilst I'm doing it it knowing that they have it on at 210.

IveSeenTheLight

Fatboy40 wrote: »

It's in Andover, in north Hampshire.

Unfortunately no house in the road concerned has sold for a while, but at the peak of the market (a couple of years back) they were going for around £250,000.

Fatboy40 wrote: »

Maybe I'm not ruthless enough, offering say 185 I'd feel guilty whilst I'm doing it it knowing that they have it on at 210.

Just had a quick search on the Land Registry.
It's just an average for Hampshire but it would appear that this area has went down 20% since the Jan 08 peak.

If they sold for £250k before then a fair price (on average) would be to take 20% off the peak price, thus £200k.

It then depends more specifically to the property, does it need any work structurally, modernising etc or is it ready to move in.

Bufger

then it sounds about right. Make sure you take into account the state of repair and use it in your arguement. Cost in how much it is for a boiler (2k?) and how much for a new drive (another 1-2k) so knock 5k off the original amount you wanted off. Remember that some of these houses for 250k in peak could have had extensions you dont know about.

Without seeing the house its hard to guess for you but i dont think you're too far off. If you can now find out how desperate the vendor is to move (what kind of circumstance they're in) you may be able to use that too. I usually arrange viewings for times EA's wont work like weekday evenings. This gives you an increased chance to get a viewing by the vendor so you can ask probing questions about the reason to move (polite and not forceful though! some arent happy stories).

Good Luck

Bufger

Fatboy40 wrote: »

Maybe I'm not ruthless enough, offering say 185 I'd feel guilty whilst I'm doing it it knowing that they have it on at 210.

Thats a common feeling. Think about it again, do you want them to be 5-10k better off or would you rather have that extra pocket money? They may be willing to take the hit to get it off their hands. They will have worked out what kind of hit they can afford beforehand.

Fatboy40

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

It then depends more specifically to the property, does it need any work structurally, modernising etc or is it ready to move in.

It's certainly ready to move in, but to make it to the standard of what I'd 'personaly' consider to be a well turned out property it certainly needs some modernising, mostly externaly (drive + garden) and the bedrooms have need to be refreshed (carpet + walls are currently papered).

I think I'm going to stick with a starting offer of 190, and myself and my wife have said that we idealy want to pay no more than 198 but will possibly go to 200 if that's all they'll take. I think at 185 the agent will just refuse to pass the offer to the vendor...

Bufger

the agent cant ever refuse to pass the offer to the vendor.