Advice Needed.

saddo

Hi All

After being let down in August by seller pulling out on day of exchange, we had to go forward with our sale, and subsequantly are now renting.
We kept looking in the location we wanted to buy for our "forever home".
And found a lovely house that needed work, it was on the market for £179.950.
The estate agent siad that the seller will not accept anything less than £175 as she needed to pay off her mortgage.
We offered £175 (this is our top budget, there is no more money in the pot), and waited for a phone call from the estate agent.
2 weeks later the estate agent called to say that she now wanted asking price only..:mad:
She also went on the say that their had been no other interest in this house and she thought our offer was very very fair in this falling market, and we are in a good position as we are cash buyers and are not in a chain.

Feeling very frustrated, we have asked the estate agent to resubmit our offer in 2 weeks time, that will give the seller a clear view of what is happening.

We were hopping to complete before xmas to save on the stamp duty as well.

Has anyone got any advice for us.

Thank you

BitterAndTwisted

I think lots of people are in the same situation as your vendor, that is, they have a figure in mind about when they need to sell at and no amount of advice or looking at the local market will persuade them that what they are seeking to achieve is unrealistic. I think resubmitting your original offer is fair but if you wanted to be really mean you could consider putting in a new offer for less than £175K. This "might" encourage the vendor to be a tad more realistic in their expectations

poppysocks1

Could you split the difference and go to £177k if you really really want it? However what will you do if the survey shows up problems and work is needed? Difficult one, you could just stand your ground, if she gets no more offers she may come back to you. Good luck!

kinglewis

They are being a little greedy in my opinion.

Stick to your guns!! (Unless it is the perfect house!!)

Limana68

I would definetley stick with your original offer and just wait for them to accept - they should be grateful of a buyer in this day!!

Milliewilly

The seller must be mad to turn down a cash buyer for such a small amount off asking. I wouldn't up the offer.

DVardysShadow

I'm more or less with Bitter and Twisted on this. I would tell agent offer is valid for 7 more days after which it is reduced to 170.

It strikes me that Agent does not want to lose saddo as buyer

joolley

Offer 173K pronto. That'll concentrate the seller's mind.
joolley

saddo

Hi all

Thank you so much for all your Advice/Replies, dont really want to p*ss them off so will wait and see what response we get when the offer is resubmitted.
Still looking on websites to see if other properties are coming on the market.

Thanks again

Bufger

get a couple of friends to have viewings whilst teeth sucking and offer 20-25k less. Then resubmit yours in 2 - 3 weeks. It wont look too shoddy then!

saddo

Well just to update you all we emailed the estate agent last night
"Just wanted to check in. Does the guy at ********** want to sell and move on? Has he had many viewings? Has anyone offered asking price? What has the feedback been like? We feel that our offer of ?175k-is really respectable when crudely based on the asking price of ?179,950- Since the start of the “Credit crunch” Have that row of two bed roomed houses, on that side of the street sold for more than that? Most people are saying how "grateful" they would be for a cash offer, so near to asking price. Can you put our offer in again as it is doable to complete by Xmas if everyone pulls together, in the new year when we look at houses again, before Gordon Brown takes his cut. "
I recieved a reply from them saying
"
I have spoken to the owner’s father to re submit your offer but his daughter and son in law are now abroad and so we won’t be able to get an answer from them until they are back, which is about 10 days away.

I completely understand where you are coming from and we too are frustrated but for now there’s nothing more that can happen until they get back! Annoying I know!

As soon as I have had a response from them I will let you know, however, it will mean that stamp duty is definitely going to have to be paid, would you still want to offer the ?175,000 knowing you will have the additional ?1750 to pay too. "

So i called them back to see where we stood and to ask if i offer £173.250 would they be interested. The reply was "NO They want asking price only and with VAT and stamp duty that would make the amount you have to pay £181-182."
I have told the estate agent that we cannot afford to pay more, so £175 is still on the table for the time being but will keep looking for other properties.

Getting Fed up with all this now..

Hope everyone is having better luck than us.