Survey Results value house 6% less than agreed sale price....what to do?

gingertips

sorry to hear your news - its frustrating I know. The fact is either the estate agent or the vendor thinks the property is worth more or is trying to get as much as possible. I wouldnt always blame the agent though...vendors look at other properties & what the asking prices are and then decides to ignore any estate agent advice and adds another 10% onto asking prices...so it may not be the Estate Agent who is at fault here

5% is 5% - if you have to sell in the future, how are you going to convince someone else that they should pay you 5% more than what a professional surveyor believes it is worth?!

I would state the case to the agent - that you are extremely annoyed you have wasted £700, that the lender will only support you on 5% reduction & the vendor needs to move their price or you will need to look elsewhere.

Just on a side note, you have gone back to the surveyor havent you and confirmed the price with them? Its just when I was buying my first house, they valued the property at £5k less than we had agreed on. I got the seller to move £2.5k but no the full £5k - then the vendor told me that the surveyor from the mortgage company had been in the property for less than 15 minutes...it turned out the idiot asked the vendor what the selling price was while he was there & wrote down the wrong number...a couple of conversations with the lender & they agreed to increase the amount they were lending.

zappahey

gingertips wrote: »

Its just when I was buying my first house, they valued the property at £5k less than we had agreed on. I got the seller to move £2.5k but no the full £5k - then the vendor told me that the surveyor from the mortgage company had been in the property for less than 15 minutes...it turned out the idiot asked the vendor what the selling price was while he was there & wrote down the wrong number...a couple of conversations with the lender & they agreed to increase the amount they were lending.

Sounds like "the idiot" saved you two and a half grand, or did you go back and negotiate the price back up?

MrJF

Everyone always praises every word that comes out of a surveyors mouth. At the end of the day the survey is the OPINION of the surveyor, and all surveyors have different OPINIONS.

Yes, they are all qualified, but still everyone is different.

We recently went for a house and it was valued £6k under the price we had offered, and our offer was £6.5k under the asking price. In our heart of hearts we felt that this didn't represent the value of the property, and appealed. The surveyor said "No, this is my valuation".

We then did some research and looked at selling prices etc, and were still convinced the house was definitely worth what we had offered, so we decided to go with a different mortgage company who use a different survey company.

We are now expecting exchange of contract today or tomorrow at the original agreed asking price :beer:

Mallotum_X

fred7777 wrote: »

The best cause of action may be to challenge the surveyors valuation.

Yes thats a good idea, after all paying more for a house is better than paying less....

oh hang on...

No the worst thing to do is to challenge the valuation, the best thing to do is try and negotiate the price down, based on a valuation by professional, not a second hand house salesman (or estate agent as they call themselves).

maryotuam

The vendors may (reluctantly) reduce their asking price again which would be great for you. Don't start worrying till you have to. It's likely prices are going to continue falling for the forseeable future. You might point out to them that if they have to put it back on the market they may just end up chasing the market down.

gingertips

zappahey wrote: »

Sounds like "the idiot" saved you two and a half grand, or did you go back and negotiate the price back up?

he was an idiot because they charged me £350 for him to spend 15 minutes at the property & write the wrong figure down on a piece of paper. He acknowledged his mistake in the end and admitted that he had only arrived at the valuation figure based on what the vendor told him - rather than on his experience or knowledge of local market prices.

No i didnt renegotiate back up to the original price...but had I stuck to my guns about the £5k reduction and not started to pester the mortgage company I would never have found out this idiot was incompatent & I would have lost the house

poppysarah

MrJF wrote: »

We then did some research and looked at selling prices etc, and were still convinced the house was definitely worth what we had offered, so we decided to go with a different mortgage company who use a different survey company.

We are now expecting exchange of contract today or tomorrow at the original agreed asking price

Well done for paying more for your money on a house than you needed to.

.moneysavingexpert.com

Greatgimp

poppysarah wrote: »

Well done for paying more for your money on a house than you needed to.

Did they say that at any time they could reduce their offer and actually get it for less than their original offer?

catfish50

MrJF wrote: »

Everyone always praises every word that comes out of a surveyors mouth. At the end of the day the survey is the OPINION of the surveyor, and all surveyors have different OPINIONS.

Yes, they are all qualified, but still everyone is different.

We recently went for a house and it was valued £6k under the price we had offered, and our offer was £6.5k under the asking price. In our heart of hearts we felt that this didn't represent the value of the property, and appealed. The surveyor said "No, this is my valuation".

We then did some research and looked at selling prices etc, and were still convinced the house was definitely worth what we had offered, so we decided to go with a different mortgage company who use a different survey company.

We are now expecting exchange of contract today or tomorrow at the original agreed asking price :beer:

Congratulations! I'm glad you got the house you want -- that's always the best buy.

fred7777

poppysarah wrote: »

This is a money saving forum you know!

I know.

Getting the valuation increased will save the buyer having to find extra money for the deposit (so money saving in the short term).

Offering a lower price would be better if the seller accepts it but the seller could reject it potentially leaving the buyer £700 down with nothing to show for it.

Personally if I was the seller and the buyer and I had agreed a price then the buyer tried to negotiate down I would be looking for another buyer. I have recently moved house and looking at what I paid to various people it seems that I would have lost a lot less as a seller if the deals had fallen through than I would have as a buyer.