To those BUYING in these difficult times....

sonastin

azkaban420 wrote: »

Hi all, hope you don't mind me joining...I feel neither here nor there in the buying and selling game of houses due to some major disappointments (sellers pulled out of house sale on the day we were due to exchange on our dream property) and allsorts...this one's a bit long so bear with me.

We are currently renting in the hope that the right property turns up. At the moment the choice is very limited. A lot of houses are very overpriced and just sitting on the market for months and months. I got a call from an EA begging me to see one such house, 4 bed detached up for £289k, been on the market since Jan with zero interest or offers. He suggested making ANY offer on it, as they'd had none in the past and were desperate to sell. I went and saw it, we did like it but it needs a fair bit of work (new kitchen/bathrooms/carpets). Before I even saw it I told him there was no way I'd be prepared to pay over the stamp duty threshold as the house was well overpriced in my opinion. I actually saw and offered on the house next door to it back in Jan (£245k) but missed out on it by £5k, and it sold for £250k making it the most expensive property sold in that cul-de-sac. That was in a better condition, slightly better layout etc imo. So I offered £230k on this one just before I went away on hol...the EA seemed grateful.

I heard nothing back so rung him asking if he'd left any messages whilst I was on hol, he said he did but I didn't get anything. He said the sellers were looking for over £250k, so I said fair enough I'm not prepared to go that high, so we'll leave it as it is.

I've seen a few other houses and nothing is suitable and I'm keen on this house, but I'm not prepared to pay over the odds for it. I don't mind negotiating but am surprised that the EA didn't even try or bother to ask me if we'd go any higher (we probably could budge a bit, but not a huge amount).

How would you play it? I called him yesterday to ask him if there were any other houses coming up in the area and he said there's nothing except the one I saw and another (too small) and I was hoping he'd ask me if I'd had any more thoughts on this house so that we could try and kick start a negotiating conversation. On one hand I would like to close the deal, on the other hand I don't want to seem desperate, as we're renting, with an AIP ready etc so ideal buyers - they should be chasing us! We could just sit tight and wait for the sellers to come back to us (although it's unlikely if they are deluded about the value of their house) or we could just bite the bullet and ask the EA if the sellers would consider £5k more?

It's so frustrating - I keep hearing it's a buyer's market and was so glad to be in a strong position, but it doesn't seem to be helping

Any thoughts are appreciated..

Az

Reading between the lines, I think the EA knows it is massively over-priced and has tried to get the vendors to be more realistic. The vendors are probably stubborn as heck and don't believe there's anything wrong with their asking price so the EA has used you to try and reinforce his argument "see the best offer I can get for you at the moment is £230k - are you sure you won't drop the AP. That might drum up some more interest from people willing to offer a bit more than that".

Sounds like he's got them to accept that over £250k is unrealistic because of the extra stamp duty kicking in but they still believe that its a steal at £250k and won't consider going below.

LilacPixie

Philippa36 wrote: »

We submitted ours on Friday (telephone application last Wed with all docs handed in to branch) and rang today to check it was all received. They have told us it will take up to 48 hours for a decision - thought it was already decided

Paranoia here too!

it's the paranoia. i hate it. I am convinced everything will crumble but i need to get into moving mode.

caeler

Offer declined. Vendor believes she can get asking price. I've left offer on table for 2 weeks so now I wait.
I hope this is just part of a game to get me to increase my offer! I'll call EA in 2 weeks if I've not heard from them.

sonastin

I think I'm talking in a foreign language.

Quick recap - EA tells me Tuesday am that vendor tells her that builders tell them it'll be 2 more weeks. Solicitor e-mails Wednesday afternoon with message from vendor's solicitor that says vendor says work will be finished Friday so when do I want to complete. Someone somewhere isn't singing from the same hymn sheet!

So Thursday I went to the house to see how far the builders had got. By then the 3/4 excavated drains are now fully excavated and they have started to insulate the partially complete stud wall in the garage. Which is lovely and I'd like a nice insulated garage ... except that the building inspector's shopping list includes the statement "remove stud wall from garage".

I contacted EA today to tell her that not only are we no closer but we are positively moving away from getting the building inspector to sign off this house and as he should be involved by now and the builders haven't contacted him, I've spoken to him. The reply from the EA is that the vendor says "yes they are insulating the stud wall in the garage and they are going to remove the stud wall from the right of the garage"
???????????????
(BTW it all needs removing and they appear to be insulating all of it so far)

I tried to arrange for my bf to go and view the house as he's the practical one but turns out that the EA no longer have keys so they have to arrange with the builder to get him access. At least that means they can no longer show the house to other interested parties so I can take a break from worrying about being gazumped for the time being. (Unless the builders want it that is!)

split_second

bluefuzzybug wrote: »

Offer declined. Vendor believes she can get asking price. I've left offer on table for 2 weeks so now I wait.
I hope this is just part of a game to get me to increase my offer! I'll call EA in 2 weeks if I've not heard from them.

unless its very cheap for what it is she is dreaming

Grimbal

Arrrrrgh! Just a bit of a self-obsessed rant now I'm afraid!

- it really feels like our (potential) vendors really don't want to keep us as buyers
- we had an offer accepted a few weeks ago on their property - the vendors have subsequently offered on 2 places, but failed to secure either of them.
- enquired what their intention was now. EA told us that they are just waiting for the right property (now? in this market? at this time of year?!), & won't move until it comes up, and will not consider renting
- not only that, but they haven't even instructed a solicitor yet

Is it me, or does it seem a bit unreasonable that 1. they haven't started getting the paperwork sorted for selling & 2. they are being so stubborn over their onward plans.

I understand that in an ideal world, we all want to move from one home into another, but they are risking us walking away if another place comes up for us by their refusal to compromise.

milliebear00001

Grimbal wrote: »

Arrrrrgh! Just a bit of a self-obsessed rant now I'm afraid!

- it really feels like our (potential) vendors really don't want to keep us as buyers
- we had an offer accepted a few weeks ago on their property - the vendors have subsequently offered on 2 places, but failed to secure either of them.
- enquired what their intention was now. EA told us that they are just waiting for the right property (now? in this market? at this time of year?!), & won't move until it comes up, and will not consider renting
- not only that, but they haven't even instructed a solicitor yet

Is it me, or does it seem a bit unreasonable that 1. they haven't started getting the paperwork sorted for selling & 2. they are being so stubborn over their onward plans.

I understand that in an ideal world, we all want to move from one home into another, but they are risking us walking away if another place comes up for us by their refusal to compromise.

My parents are selling and are a bit like this. Frustrating as it is for buyers, some vendors just don't need to sell. They are speculatively putting their house on the market and can take or leave offers.

If you walk away, it might just not be that big a deal for them, whereas the upheaval of renting and then moving again, might be.

westlondonbuyer

Speculative vendors are bizarre. I was a nervous, frantic wreck both times we sold. Having to keep the place spick and span and be gone at a moment's notice was utterly exhausting. It's so strange that you'd put yourself through this and the trauma of having total strangers in your house (and very often slagging off your taste and possessions) just on the offchance that someone might neglect to do their internet research and pay your asking price.

sonastin

I know where milliebear00001 is coming from, but I'm with Grimbal and westlondonbuyer. Surely they had a plan of where they were going to go and why before they put their house on the market. Otherwise, why bother? So has something changed with their original plan in the intervening months and they failed to notice, or forgot to take their house off the market when the reason for moving changed? Or did they just believe the hype that it's a buyers market and there are hundreds of sellers desperately wanting to sell and they thought they could snap up a bargain in seconds without doing any research beforehand?

satchmeister

Grimbal wrote: »

Arrrrrgh! Just a bit of a self-obsessed rant now I'm afraid!

- it really feels like our (potential) vendors really don't want to keep us as buyers
- we had an offer accepted a few weeks ago on their property - the vendors have subsequently offered on 2 places, but failed to secure either of them.
- enquired what their intention was now. EA told us that they are just waiting for the right property (now? in this market? at this time of year?!), & won't move until it comes up, and will not consider renting
- not only that, but they haven't even instructed a solicitor yet

Is it me, or does it seem a bit unreasonable that 1. they haven't started getting the paperwork sorted for selling & 2. they are being so stubborn over their onward plans.

I understand that in an ideal world, we all want to move from one home into another, but they are risking us walking away if another place comes up for us by their refusal to compromise.

Sounds like they have no need to move unless they can get the perfect property very cheap. I would start looking again as it is unlikely IMHO that they will move - they are not spending any money so they are not really serious.