Offer on our house - how do we play it?

delmar39

Hi there

Our house has been on the market for 2 months. First Estate Agent we had was useless so we moved to another 3 weeks ago and have had a lot of interest since.

First offer yesterday, but £17k below the asking price. Clearly we have a target figure in mind to secure our next property (we've put a deposit on a new build), but at the same time we don't want to miss a positive opportunity. They put the offer in at 2pm yesterday just as the Estate Agent was closing so nothing has moved since, other than me opening the vino to take the stress away!

We cannot accept the first offer so it will be rejected today, but has anyone got any advice as to how to play this? I guess the Estate Agent will do what they can negotiation wise, but I don't want to lose this one. They want to live in the area, they love the house so I do think there's room for improving their offer.

Thoughts welcome.

:rolleyes:

pawpurrs

How much is your house up for? What sort of % under is the offer?

SailorSam

Selling a house is a terrible time and you're never sure whether you're making the right decision.
I moved a little over 2yrs ago, i had an offer fairly quickly on my old house which i turned down, i knew it was worth more. A year later i still hadn't sold and finally accepted less than i could have got 18mths earlier. I still think it was worth more.
Is there any chance you could go back to the builder of your new build and get them to bring that price down.
Good luck.

delmar39

Hi thanks for both replies. In response to first one, our house is on for £234,950 and first offer is £218k. Around 7.25% under the asking price so not pitched at traditional 10% below, but still a significant amount under.

In response to second post, our plan is to go to the builder and see if they can come down a bit, but until we know what the buyer is going to do in relation to a potential second offer, we're going to sit it out and approach the builder when we know more.

Like I said, I don't want to miss this opportunity.

DVardysShadow

You need to ask them for an amount which sends a message of the price they must meet. Like if you want 225, tell the agent to tell them that you need an adequate offer to make your next move and they must match 227

moneysaver

delmar39 wrote: »

Around 7.25% under the asking price so not pitched at traditional 10% below, but still a significant amount under.

What is the house actually valued at?



Moneysaver

27col

The house is only worth what the buyer is willing to pay, not what you say it is worth. If the buyer really wants to buy it then they will compromise, and if you really want to sell, then you will compromise as well.
The fact that you need a certain amount in order to move on is unfortunate, but of no concern to the prospective buyer. They are probably constrained as well in some way, as to the amount that they can borrow. There is always going to have to be a compromise on both sides. If they genuinely cannot afford to increase their offer and you genuinely cannot afford to reduce the price, then the sale will have to fall through. It seems to me that you have to indicate the minimum offer that you can accept and see what happens.

delmar39

Thanks for the advice.

The average of our valuations put the house at £234,950 with a view to accepting realistic offers around this valuation. An offer of £218,000 is just on the low side for me and regardless of budget for new house, I'm not giving the house away. I'm willing to compromise, but at the moment their offer isn't exactly meeting us halfway. I'll see if they put another offer in and take it from there. Anything around £225k and above would we be worth considering I think, but perhaps we're just not going to get that in the current market. Next port of call is the builder to see if they can come down with their price......that way we can start to consider offers that are lower than we expected.

ruggedtoast

Based on my experience of selling dont assume anything about the agent - other than the possibility that they are a total idiot who could balls up selling a life raft to a drowning man.

Assuming you are happy to negotiate, if you want to keep the negotiations going instruct the agent to go back to the buyers with another figure. Hopefully you can meet in the middle.

If you're hoping they'll play some canny game of cat and mouse you may be disappointed. Theyre just as likely to leave a message on the buyers voicemail saying "The owners of number 59 rejected your offer. Its far too low and you wasted our time. Bye"

thriftyamy

I find it a bit frustrating that estate agents regularly advise people to put their house on the market for a standard 7-10K above the expected achievable price, 10K is a sniff of 235 but would seem very significant if the property was on at 100k, 218 is a very good first offer!

I'd agree with DVardysShadow in my experience, EVERYONE involved will be looking to save face/achieve some kind of moral victory so you're best to go back saying you want a bit more than you do, then you can demonstrate some negotiation down to a slightly lower figure and they will feel like they managed to 'battle you down' (even though they didn't)!

delmar39

Cheers guys and girls. We've rejected the first offer and will see what they come back with. If we don't hear back I'll follow the advice above and tell the Estate Agent to go back with a figure. It's just that budget is tight so the more the merrier (perhaps stating the obvious here). I'm also going to talk to the builder in a minute to see if they can come down a bit on the new place so that we can start to consider lower offers - if they can't come down then at least we know where we stand.

All the best.