Are we been shafted ?

Boomycol

Me and the wife been in our house for 13 years and had to move so our son can get into a decent secondary school, Birmingham to Solihull.

Seen 6 estate agents and took the best one been the local one who we knew has sold houses in our area before.

House is 2 bedroom non road facing (side on) terraced house 19 years old, with pretty spacey gardens 3 car offroad drive and massive detached bricks & mortar garage (yep you can fit an passat estate in it easy), in a private (big massive brick wall around it) quiet non council cul-de-sac.

Now we wanted a very quick move as the school application needs to be in by mid October which we told the agents. House went to market 10th June at £105,000.

We had 3 viewings and 2 came back twice and we sold it 18 day later for £100,000. We knew before hand the buyer couldnt afford more than £100,000.

Now the buyer could only get a mortgage for £98,800. So as we wanted a quick move we would take the drop on the chin.

We house our new house after 3 weeks and wend on holiday for a week and the buyers surveyor came in the following monday.

I was at work but she came checked the loft, walls and measured the house fully back to front & width and also the garden as well but she missed off our garage didnt even check it out look at it or measure it yet its is bricks and mortar.

We get a call saying surveyor gone in fine then hour later get another one saying that she has valued the house at only £95,000 !!!!

Were like what ?? the exact same hosue sold 18 months ago for £106,000 and the last house to be sold for £95,000 was 5 YEARS AGO! and that didnt have a garage.

They have all sold for over £100,000 since then.

Now we feel we Have been under valued. The surveyor works for Colleys found the surveyors email address and guess what it is a Halifax.co.uk email address and the buyers mortgage provider is Halifax.

We feel well screwed over by the fact that the surveyor isnt independant to the mortgage provider and feell as though they have shafted us.

Now we have been told we are not allowed to see the surveyors home valuation report to see if she has actually mentioned the garage or was even aware of it because she was definately not local.

Our solicitor says they dont see it and with the valuation there is absolutely nothing you can do about it.

I have got the land registry sales from their site and shows all previous sales as well as the list from Zoopla and all show nothing has sold for less that £100,000.

The buyer has said they are now only prepared to pay the £95,000

We actually dont want to lose the buyer because me must have the quick sale to move in time but from the original £105,000 it went to market at selling it at £95,000 is proper gutting for us and will probably screw our mortgage up as we are on the limit anyway and cant get the extra £3,800 we need to get our new mortgage for our new house.

They are blaming the markets but we fell its bull because the estate agents knows we must have a quick move and we do have equity with £50,000 deposit from the sale, they are peaved we are not actually buying a house from them and dont care about the selling price because they are getting a fixed fee. We feel they are only working with the buyer to get the price for her and know we already have the noose around our head and ahve no choice

Is there any avenues that we can do take to get hold of the home valuation report and also contest it using the land registry previous sales. Any help is very much appreciated.

G_M

You have no right to see the valuation, but if you say without seeing it you will not dop your price, they might choose to show you.

End of the day you have to decide how vital it is for you to sell, at this time. If vital, you have little choice but to drop the price. Otherwise stick to your guns, stick to the price, and leave the buyer to decide whether to throw away his survey fee/legal fee/mortgage application fee, or to stump up the agreed price.

ruggedtoast

Boomycol wrote: »

Is there any avenues that we can do take to get hold of the home valuation report and also contest it using the land registry previous sales. Any help is very much appreciated.

The survey is commissioned by the buyer, it belongs to them. It would be up to them to challenge the lender about it. The lender makes less money out of smaller mortgages not more, so I'm not sure what your problem with the surveyor is. Their valuation will be an opinion.

You're really over complicating this anyway. Where the buyers gets their funds from is their problem. If you think you are being sold short then call the deal off. If you cant get the price you want and wont sell for less then dont sell.

princeofpounds

Although it's probable that the agent is more interested in broking a sale rather than getting you the best price, I think you need to be a bit realistic here.

If you look at any of the major house price indices (not asking prices like rightmove) then you will see that nationally house prices are in fact at about 2006 levels. i.e. five years ago. I don't know about your specific area, but as a generality it is not that wide of the mark.

eg: http://www.nationwide.co.uk/hpi/Default.asp?calculate=true

Why you would expect the buyer's surveyor to be independent of the mortgage lender I do not know. The mortgage lenders always have their own valuation survey and all they care about it not lending more money than they think the property is worth.

I assume the buyers are either using the results of that valuation survey or commissioned their own from the same umbrella company.

They are not necessarily trying to talk a property down. The lender is in the business of lending money on houses, so they WANT to lend money, but critically not more than they think the house is worth. Surveyors are a bit more cautious post-crisis as they can be held liable if they value totally wildly, but they don't have a huge vested interest.

Yes, you have some valid points with regards to comparative sales, but don't expect to get very far with them.

Losing just under 10% from your asking price is not a particularly relevant figure. That is pretty standard these days (the difference between the rightmove asking price index and the actual sold indexes has widened by almost that much along since the crisis), although it ultiimately depends on how high your asking price was on an individual basis it is another generality that might give you a clue.

So all in all you are not getting ripped off. You are being chipped away at, but the market is like that these days in most areas of the uk. Up to you whether you want to transact or not.

dopester

Were like what ?? the exact same hosue sold 18 months ago for £106,000 and the last house to be sold for £95,000 was 5 YEARS AGO! and that didnt have a garage.

The value of housing can fall as well as rise and you may get back less than originally invested. Even from purchase price back in 2006 (5 years ago, and maybe as far back as 150 years depending on how things play out). Some areas are down to 2003/04 price levels.

john_white

princeofpounds wrote: »

Although it's probable that the agent is more interested in broking a sale rather than getting you the best price, I think you need to be a bit realistic here.

If you look at any of the major house price indices (not asking prices like rightmove) then you will see that nationally house prices are in fact at about 2006 levels. i.e. five years ago. I don't know about your specific area, but as a generality it is not that wide of the mark.

eg: http://www.nationwide.co.uk/hpi/Default.asp?calculate=true

Why you would expect the buyer's surveyor to be independent of the mortgage lender I do not know. The mortgage lenders always have their own valuation survey and all they care about it not lending more money than they think the property is worth.

I assume the buyers are either using the results of that valuation survey or commissioned their own from the same umbrella company.

They are not necessarily trying to talk a property down. The lender is in the business of lending money on houses, so they WANT to lend money, but critically not more than they think the house is worth. Surveyors are a bit more cautious post-crisis as they can be held liable if they value totally wildly, but they don't have a huge vested interest.

Yes, you have some valid points with regards to comparative sales, but don't expect to get very far with them.

Losing just under 10% from your asking price is not a particularly relevant figure. That is pretty standard these days (the difference between the rightmove asking price index and the actual sold indexes has widened by almost that much along since the crisis), although it ultiimately depends on how high your asking price was on an individual basis it is another generality that might give you a clue.

So all in all you are not getting ripped off. You are being chipped away at, but the market is like that these days in most areas of the uk. Up to you whether you want to transact or not.

Rightmove shows sold prices.

ruggedtoast

No it doesnt.

dopester

ruggedtoast wrote: »

No it doesnt.

It does. In a special section away from housing and asking prices listings. Updated after transactions have all been formalised and recorded at the Land Registry.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-prices.html

overnetworld

Where in Birmingham is the property ? You could ask the agent to re market the property and see if you get any more interest

As for are you being shafted....prob yes.... The buyer could have tried it on when they said they can only get a mortgage for 98,800, they also might be trying it on with the valuation (first more likely than second)

Caveat_Mortgagor

john_white wrote: »

Rightmove shows sold prices.

You can find sold prices on Rightmove. But the Rightmove index is generated simply from the asking prices of new instructions.

The sold prices you mention later are generated from Land Registry records and can also be found on many other sites.

Princeofpounds made reference to house price indices. He is right to say the rightmove index is compiled from asking prices. You are correct that sold prices can be found on Rightmove, but you miss the fact that he wasnt stating whether you can find sold prices if you look, he was commenting on the validity of the overall index.

Moving on to the OP's disbelief that the surveyor could give the same value as 5 years ago, I have looked on Land Registry for the following:

The average selling price of a terraced house in Birmingham as of June 2011 is £93,686.

If we look at the average price exactly 5 years earlier, in June 2006 the average for a terrace in Birmingham was £104, 319.

They dont see it, but they should snap someones hand off for a 2006 price. Prices for terraced houses in the area are currently back at May 2004 levels when the average terrace sold for 93,824.

Its fair to say that Birmingham and the west mids has been particularly hard hit in recent years. I am surprised the OP is surprised!

hazyjo

Sounds fair to me - as said, prices are in a lot of areas down to 2006 (or earlier) prices. Seeing as many people are trying to knock more than 10% off, I'd bite their arm off. I don't think they've dropped you that much from your initial asking price...

Sometimes valuations are just done as a 'drive by'. They don't spend hours inspecting the house. Most of it's worked out from previous sales of similar properties in the area.

Jx