Nationwide Valuer's drive by & undervaluing

jolikyle

Hi all, any advice would be greatly appreciated. We put our house on the market 1 1/2 years ago and it was valued at £260,000. About 3 months ago we reduced the value to £ 230,00 on understanding that if it hadn't sold by time our current mortgage deal came to an end we would take it off market to organise that. Well we've now done that and have applied through a broker for a 5yr fixed deal of 3.59% on understaning that our house is 70%LTV or below, which we were assured it def would be for borrowing 110,000. Well Nationwide have organised a drive by valuation and they have come back with the astounding of £152,000 for a value!! They are seriously suggesting its lost £98,000 value in 1 1/2 years!! Where do we go from here? this valusation obviously suits them as if we accept it we can only go to a 3.99% mortgage. and worse still we've been told that most lenders use this sub contracted company, who work to their advantage. help...

plane_boy2000

Firstly a house is only worth what somebody is willing to pay for it, so you couldn't sell at 260K, or 230K, so to be fair their valuation had to be less than that.

They may have an appeals process, but you would need to be able to prove it is of a higher value, so for example, have any similar houses sold in your road recently?

GMS

Is your house in line with the rest in the street or is it improved, i.e extended?

You can always ask your broker to go back to the lender and ask them for an internal inspection but there is a huge difference in yours and their estimates. Would need some persuading for the valuer to up it.

Have you looked for sold comparables in the area? Ask your broker to research this and provide the evidence if it is there

jolikyle

Thanks for your reply,

Yeah, two very similar properties, one at £195,000 and one £210,000. We will appeal but really is there much point? has anyone got a poor valuation changed? They didn't even set foot on our property so its an absurd method to calue it!

Again the banks have their methods of ripping us off one way or another- yeah they'll offer a good rate for good LTV but rip it back off with a low value. And what of someone who hasn't had any sales in area- we live in country so are fortunate to have two examples close by. When will they stop being so underhand.

Thrugelmir

I assume that you are looking to remortgage to the Nationwide. So I would query why a drive by valuation has been performed.

Are you looking to borrow more than your existing mortgage?

jolikyle

Hi GMS

Yeah the two i mentioned in above reply are very close in style, size (all 4 bed detached), all new builds, the lower figure of £195,000 was a house sold without even being finished off inside, no kitchens, bathrooms etc. Feeling very hard done by with our valuation. Its also pretty coincidental that to meet to 70% LTV the valuation only had to be at £160,000. A pretty low figure in itself, never mind them conveniently going lower. Our broker was flabergasted as well. will try to appeal but won;t hold my breath- can;t imagine it ever works.

Thanks for help

jolikyle

Thrugelmir wrote: »

I assume that you are looking to remortgage to the Nationwide. So I would query why a drive by valuation has been performed.

Are you looking to borrow more than your existing mortgage?

We were moving mortgage provider to get a better deal at end of existing 2yr deal, on brokers advice- on the irony!! Lol

redped

As plane_boy2000 said, a house is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it.

You had it "valued" at £260K, and it didn't sell - so it wasn't actually worth £260K.

You then dropped the price to £230K, and again it didn't sell - it therefore wasn't worth £230K either.

So perhaps the latest valuation of £152K has been given by someone who actually knows the true value of the property. I'd be more annoyed at the people who valued it at £260K, and then £230K, given that it didn't sell at either figure.

jolikyle

redped wrote: »

As plane_boy2000 said, a house is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it.

You had it "valued" at £260K, and it didn't sell - so it wasn't actually worth £260K.

You then dropped the price to £230K, and again it didn't sell - it therefore wasn't worth £230K either.

So perhaps the latest valuation of £152K has been given by someone who actually knows the true value of the property. I'd be more annoyed at the people who valued it at £260K, and then £230K, given that it didn't sell at either figure.

Well on that premise sure we'll all value our houses at £150, they'll definately sell then! You can to a certain extent base value on what someone is prepared to pay but i think in this case the value was more for mortage provider benefit and valuer's benefit, once bitten twice shy so they'll err majorly on side of caution for fear of being sued like they were when market fell thru the floor. And as for knowing the true value- he judged from one viewpoint, a front garden that hadn't been completed. You can't see back extension of house or landscaped back garden from roadside and he hasn't set foot inside so in no way does he know my house.

As i said in first post, it was only reduced for 3months. We had intersted parties but deals fall through- not our fault and we had to take it off market to remortgage. Even our rates valuation was a lot higher and we've been told a lot of mortgages prviders use it plus 5% as a guide. We have now gathered address of properties that have sold less than 1/2 mile away. The more i talk to people the more i'm determined to get value changed. Don't think there is anywhere is country a 4 bed detached new build house on 1/2 acre plot would be valued at that.
Thanks for the advise tho- taken on board!?!

saverbuyer

I notice from your post you mention rates. I take it the property is in Northern Ireland. If that is indeed the case, new build, in the country, it is highly likely that the bank valuation is close to the actual value. As others have said, if you couldn't get shot of it at 230K then the value is lower.

Your logic above "Well on that premise sure we'll all value our houses at £150" doesn't take into account the fact buyers would compete and drive the price up to the true level.

Oh and just to add, valuers in N.I. are most definitely not using rateable value +5% as a guide. It's more like rateable value -20%. Rateable value was set in 2005. All new builds are giving a rateable value based on a reasonable price you could expect in 2005. Prices have dropped back to 2002 levels so the rateable value is pretty useless apart from affecting your rates. I would look to get it reassessed much lower not higher.

jolikyle

saverbuyer wrote: »

I notice from your post you mention rates. I take it the property is in Northern Ireland. If that is indeed the case, new build, in the country, it is highly likely that the bank valuation is close to the actual value. As others have said, if you couldn't get shot of it at 230K then the value is lower.

Your logic above "Well on that premise sure we'll all value our houses at £150" doesn't take into account the fact buyers would compete and drive the price up to the true level.

Oh and just to add, valuers in N.I. are most definitely not using rateable value +5% as a guide. It's more like rateable value -20%. Rateable value was set in 2005. All new builds are giving a rateable value based on a reasonable price you could expect in 2005. Prices have dropped back to 2002 levels so the rateable value is pretty useless apart from affecting your rates. I would look to get it reassessed much lower not higher.

We're comparing what other similar, if not smaller, properties have sold in past 6month max at- around the £200k, we'd sale agreed at 230,000 as i have previously stated. And as for rateable value not coming into play, we were advised this by our current mortgage provider- in northern ireland!! oh and also by our broker, in northern ireland!! Tho a ni dept finance report has shown a 7% reduction in2005 values - so 7-10% below rateable value wud probably be a better basis and one i'd agree with. - that give us a value of just over £170,000

I have also had it assesd using % values from what market has dropped. To be worth £152000, the market would need to have dropped near 30% in the 2 years since we last had it valued, and i'm refering to when our last remortgage occured and it was valued by a mortgage assessor then at just under £210,000. (i do understand market value then valued at £260,00 and mortgage values to be somewhat dif) Name me one market think tank and assesor who is claiming this to be true. Maybe close to this % in past 5-6 years, especially in NI but certainly not in 2 years!
Yes a bit of realism is needed in this market but this is beyond that. A value of say £170 would hve been a bit reduction, hard to swallow, but realistic.

Lets not all jump on the haha your house price has fell bandwagon- we're all in same boat. All i asked for was advice on how to move forward from an extreme reduction which i received and have started our appeal.