William h brown???

chris180682

botchjob wrote: »

Do the maths. It’s the seller that is refusing to budge, not the estate agent. Estate agents make money by turning over as many properties as they can, as quickly as they can. A property that has been sitting on their books for a year is no use to them whatsoever until it actually sells. I’m sure they’ll be doing all they can to persuade the seller that they may have to revise their bottom line if they actually want to sell.

Assuming a 1.5% commission, the estate agent would earn a whole 90 quid more by selling it for £121k than they would for £115k. The estate agent just wants rid of it and is not going to play silly games for the sake of a few quid either way.

Decide what the house is worth to you, then make your best and final offer to the agent in a decisive and final way. Be candid and friendly and hopefully the agent will make a good case for you to the vendor. Then it’s up to them.

And there’s no point in waiting a week. If I were the vendor I’d take that as a sign of indecisiveness or game playing, neither or which are qualities I’d look for in a buyer. Being straightforward and open is the best approach.

Thanks. I see what you're saying but on the other hand loads of people say the exact opposite and that you shouldn't go straight back in with further offers or the agent and/or vendor will assume you will keep going higher. I'm not sure what their exact commission will be but I do know that some EA charge set fee's over/under certain thresholds so that's a possibility but you are probably not far off with the 1.5% estimate.

chris180682

stokesley wrote: »

We made a low-ish offer on a William H Brown house about a year ago - it was rejected, but they did put the offer forward to the vendor, and confirmed the rejection on a completed form. We've found that they vary depending on the Branch Manager - our nearest city branch is utterly useless. The local branch is superb, with an extremely able manager.

BTW, the property we offered on is still for sale and has now dropped in price to just over what we offered:D.

Cheers. We did get a letter through confirming the £110k had been put to the vendor and they would let us know but this is just a formality as they told us over the phone that day it had been rejected. I will wait to see if they send confirmation out regarding the offer of £115k as I understand they legally have to let the vendor know unless the vendor has told them not to even entertain offers below a certain amount. I don't think I've got much to lose in giving it a week or so unless someone happens to come in in that time but I doubt that.

chris180682

LandyAndy wrote: »

Put your final offer in writing to the EA. Send a copy to the vendor.

Thanks for the reply. I may look at doing this but is there actually any difference in putting it in writing rather than over the phone and how would I send a copy to the vendor?

GDB2222

chris180682 wrote: »

Thanks. I see what you're saying but on the other hand loads of people say the exact opposite and that you shouldn't go straight back in with further offers or the agent and/or vendor will assume you will keep going higher. I'm not sure what their exact commission will be but I do know that some EA charge set fee's over/under certain thresholds so that's a possibility but you are probably not far off with the 1.5% estimate.

I agreed 100% with the first half of Botchjob's post. I think EAs aren't interested in getting the last penny for their clients. However, I disagreed with the part of the post saying to go in with your best offer straight away. It's a matter of tactics and giving the vendors a chance to think about your offer. That's not indecisive. If you go in early with your best offer the vendors won't believe that's your best offer and they'll want more.

rosyw

From my own experience of deal with William H Brown, I would wait for them to come back to you about your 2nd offer, if it's a no then ask for another viewing and talk directly to the vendors. The branch I dealt with were useless, I got different information depending on which member of staff answered my calls, I was told that the vendors needed X amount to be able to clear the mortgage, then when a problem arose with the property and I lowered my offer to BELOW that figure , it was accepted!! Once I had the vendors phone numer and they had mine it was so much easier, and I should point out that they were as unimpressed with their EA as I was!

chris180682

rosyw wrote: »

From my own experience of deal with William H Brown, I would wait for them to come back to you about your 2nd offer, if it's a no then ask for another viewing and talk directly to the vendors. The branch I dealt with were useless, I got different information depending on which member of staff answered my calls, I was told that the vendors needed X amount to be able to clear the mortgage, then when a problem arose with the property and I lowered my offer to BELOW that figure , it was accepted!! Once I had the vendors phone numer and they had mine it was so much easier, and I should point out that they were as unimpressed with their EA as I was!

I would love to see the vendor face to face as when agreeing a price on my current house myself and the buyer did all the negotiating ourselves over the phone and face to face and ir was so much quicker and easier and as you said both of us were not impressed with the EA! Unfortunately the vendor on this one works away a lot and the EA have been doing the viewings, infact i dont think the vendor lives there anymore, at least not full time so this doesn't seem to be an option.

chris180682

GDB2222 wrote: »

I agreed 100% with the first half of Botchjob's post. I think EAs aren't interested in getting the last penny for their clients. However, I disagreed with the part of the post saying to go in with your best offer straight away. It's a matter of tactics and giving the vendors a chance to think about your offer. That's not indecisive. If you go in early with your best offer the vendors won't believe that's your best offer and they'll want more.

Yes i agree totally with this, if i just come out and offer my maximum the vendor will presume i can up it, i know thats what i would think if it was me so althougj the EA might not be bothered about playing games im sure the vendor will to some extent as he obviously wants as much as he can get while we want to pay as little as possible hence im def going to leave it a while now as im regretting going in with the 2nd offer so soon already

chris180682

Right I've left it a week and no call from EA so may leave it another few days or so then call back. Strangely we didn't get a letter as confirmation of our second offer but we did with our first so I'm wondering whether the second offer was even passed to vendor or noted by EA as I said before she was quite dismissive of it so maybe the vendor has told them not to entertain offers under a certain amount. Anyway when I do phone back I will just say I'm enquiring as to whether my last offer was passed on as we haven't had confirmation in writing of it. I would have thought that if they have it on record that we have offered £115k and the vendor's minimum is supposedly £121k then they would be ringing back as that's only £6k apart!

googler

chris180682 wrote: »

Right I've left it a week and no call from EA so may leave it another few days or so then call back.

It's standard practice in Scotland for offers to have a limit date by which they must be accepted, or are thereafter assumed to be withdrawn. I don't see any difficulty in doing this for a written offer in E&W.

If you'd done this, you would have had an answer before your limit date, rather than waiting a week without any contact......

chris180682

OK I will look at doing this. Only thing is that if I put it in writing now I presume they will just phone me as soon as they receive it but it's worth a try. Do you know if this regulation applies even if the vendor has stated to EA they won't entertain offers below their minimum figure?