estate agent valuation

slangrish

We're currently booking estate agents to come round and give us a valuation of our flat as we look to remortgage. we're not interested in moving (unless for some incredible reason our flat has gone up from the £200k we paid for it two years ago, which we very much doubt!) so i just wondered how important it was to get a spot-on valuation and which say of a few figures, would it be best to go with? higher or lower? we're asking obviously for a figure from the lenders pov but should we get different amounts from each agent are you supposed to give prospective lenders the higher one of the lower? apologies if this sounds stupid.. im two years on from being a ftb and learning as i go..

Wutang_2

slangrish wrote: »

We're currently booking estate agents to come round and give us a valuation of our flat as we look to remortgage. we're not interested in moving (unless for some incredible reason our flat has gone up from the £200k we paid for it two years ago, which we very much doubt!) so i just wondered how important it was to get a spot-on valuation and which say of a few figures, would it be best to go? higher or lower? we're asking obviously for a figure from the lenders pov but shold we get different amounts from each agent are you supposed to give prospective lenders the higher one of the lower? apologies if this sounds stupid.. im two years on from being a ftb and learning as i go..

Don't bother - whatever they say is irrelevant as mortgage company will use their own valuation. Ring them all now and say "false alarm gringo".

Leew1231

Your lender will not take any amount suggested from an estate agent. They will require you to pay them for someone to go survey it. It will however give you an idea of the expected value to see if this may be worth doing or not. I would however take the average of whatever figures you are given and reduce it by 15% to get somewhere near what the surveyor is likely to say it is worth.

VIGILANT22

Leew1231 wrote: »

Your lender will not take any amount suggested from an estate agent. They will require you to pay them for someone to go survey it. It will however give you an idea of the expected value to see if this may be worth doing or not. I would however take the average of whatever figures you are given and reduce it by 15% to get somewhere near what the surveyor is likely to say it is worth.

In bold not necessarily true...plenty lenders offering free vals on rmtgs....
Estate agents are salesmen.........the lender will appoint a chartered surveyor......

beecher2

Use the Nationwide index to give yourself an idea, or phone up your lender to ask them what they have your house valued at

http://www.nationwide.co.uk/hpi/calculator.asp

Look at nethouseprices to see what neighbouring houses have gone for recently. Booking an estate agent is a waste of time, as others have said.

JA1000

The EA will sense what you have done immediately. Over inflate the price just to get your business.

Yet again someone desperate to get another deal - what is your SVR?

slangrish

thanks for all your help so far.. right now according to the nationwide calculator our house price has dropped -7.85%.. to £185k alas.. but to be expected I guess. using the nethouse prices no flats in our apartment block have been sold recently. we're currently with Nationwide and as far as I can tell their SVR (that is standard variable rate right?) or SMR as they call it is 3.99% unless theres something Im missing..??

beecher2

I thought their SVR was 2.5% for existing customers. Best idea might be to stay on that and overpay like mad.

jw2003

beecher2 wrote: »

Use the Nationwide index to give yourself an idea, or phone up your lender to ask them what they have your house valued at

http://www.nationwide.co.uk/hpi/calculator.asp

Look at nethouseprices to see what neighbouring houses have gone for recently. Booking an estate agent is a waste of time, as others have said.

Sorry OT for the op but thanks Beecher for those links we bought our first home 12 months ago and according to nethouseprices the last time a house sold for less than we paid was 2004

dimbo61

You say you paid £200K two years ago for the property and its now worth about £185K.
What size of deposit did you put down?
How long is the mortgage over ( IE have you paid much off the mortgage debt)
Nationwide have a BMR at 2.5% and an SMR of 3.99% ( which one does your mortgage revert to ??).
If you have little or no equity then you are stuck with Nationwide and you are best to contact them to see what deals ( if any ) they have for you

slangrish

we purchased using the 'easy-start' scheme which is basically a shared equity mortgage to my knowledge that involved them paying the deposit, all legal fees, a £1k bonus and other FTB attractions for our new-build flat. They put up the 25% and we took out a mortgage for the rest (£150k) when we sell eventually, DWH take 25% of whatever we receive unless at some point we manage to but back that percentage from them. we have been paying interest-only repayments for the last two years so no debt cleared or equity as yet. i'm assuming this being the case that our options are very limited. our advisor has said it might not be such a bad thing to stay with nationwide at their SVR of 2.5% and like has been said here, overpay as much as possible and just keep an eye on the rate..