House selling

csh_2

With only a one viewing in nearly a month I would suggest that te house was overpriced to being with.
If you are happy with the low offer and can still afford the house you want and all the timescales will add up then I would stick with that.
An asking price is only that, an asking price. How does this price compare with recent like for like sales in the area?

Money: I got £20k off the price of this house I've just bought and it was only £115k. I originally offered £25k under home report value but came up £5k to secure it.
Regardless of the HR value (Scotland) I compared sold prices in te surrounding streets and although there was nothing identical to compare with this house still appeared at least £10k overpriced.

moneyistooshorttomention

Then maybe there is a difference there. I've done a lot of checking around on prices and my house isn't overpriced - if anything its a little bit on the underpriced side.

Maybe I'd react a bit differently personally if my house was on at an "optimistic" price - but it isn't.

We have a bit of a problem at the moment in this area - with new Help to Buy houses taking some of the "customers" - but I'm following that and they will be gone from the equation shortly thank goodness (only a handful of them left) and us second-hand houses will have our fair "crack of the whip" again.

We are down again, to some extent, to what area the house concerned is in and how fast the local housing market is going (and thankfully I'm not in a "slow" area) - so once that hiccup has been dealt with we'll be "back to normal".

EDIT: I took the precaution of offering a reasonable amount for the house I want (once I have my own buyer) in order to make sure that I wasn't in the "it wouldn't be immoral to gazump me" situation I wouldn't accept myself. I must have offered enough - as I'm told the vendor is delighted...

dj.boz

I think you have done the right thing. What is more important to you, getting maximum out of your property, or moving swiftly and efficiently?

Whilst people may say 'you have lost £20,000' the other person hasnt put an offer in, so no one can tell you you have lost it, you didnt have it to start with!

I did the same when I sold my house, I had an offer, thought about it over the weekend (as the offer came in late on Friday afternoon). during the weekend someone else contact the EA and requested a veiwing, which we declined.

Also depends on whether you believe in Karma!!

moneyistooshorttomention

dj.boz wrote: »

Also depends on whether you believe in Karma!!

I certainly believe in "what goes round comes round" and would certainly be interested to know what happens to people who nick a bit of the savings a seller has got tied-up in their house by paying them an unfairly low price for said house (hmmm....a future employer deciding to cut their salary just when it would hurt them most seems fairly appropriate..;)).

Whooo...now that could be a whole new thread on the Discussion Board - asking people who had done that underpaying to say several years down the line what had happened to their own finances since then....

HarryBarry

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

My basic viewpoint is to stick to a deal I have agreed with a buyer. However, that is based on the buyer offering a fair price (meaning asking price or not much less than asking price - say only £2/£3k under asking price). So my asking price is £170k and I would agree and stick to a price down to £167k - or possibly if "push came to shove" and the house had been on the market for ages (over 6 months) then £165k if I absolutely had to.

I would never agree a price of £20k off in the first place. I am assuming the fact that you agreed such a huge discount means that your house is a particularly expensive one?? - ie £300,000 or more level...

If you've agreed to drop such a large amount on a house that is worth, say, £500k then that's one thing - but if you agreed that on, say, a £200k house then that buyer hasn't been very "moral" to you offering you so much less than the house is up for sale for. If a buyer were that not "moral" to me - then I wouldn't feel compelled to be "moral" to them.

So £20k off a £500k house I would probably stick to - but £20k off a £200k house - I'd think "That buyer was the one that started the lacking in morals bit with such a low offer" and I would accept a subsequent higher offer that was nearer to my asking price.

I would certainly feel "do as you would be done by" and I would regard that first buyer as having treated me unfairly with such a low offer.

I'd never consider any offer as lacking morals, as its quite simple for the seller to say no with no harm done. It's only an asking price and most people initially try to get as much as possible so might price it high initially, it doesnt mean its worth that much.

My girlfriend bought her house for 135k with it on at 150k. They didn't have any other offers and that was the price that was acceptable to both parties. 20k off of a 200k house - I'm just about to try that myself, I don't know why you wouldnt try to negotiate as low as possible. Just as the people in this house have negotiated (around) 35k off of the house they are moving to. If most people feel the same way as you, I think I now understand how property prices boomed in the first place (and I'll probably need to change my attitude if I have my offers continually rejected).

HarryBarry

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

I certainly believe in "what goes round comes round" and would certainly be interested to know what happens to people who nick a bit of the savings a seller has got tied-up in their house by paying them an unfairly low price for said house (hmmm....a future employer deciding to cut their salary just when it would hurt them most seems fairly appropriate..;)).

Whooo...now that could be a whole new thread on the Discussion Board - asking people who had done that underpaying to say several years down the line what had happened to their own finances since then....

Well in my partners case, she got 15k off of the asking price. Had she borrowed the extra 15k (which she was probably willing to go up to but they accepted the first offer) she would be paying interest on it at around 4%. After 25 years including the interest, she will be about 24k better off for a start. But not only that, as she wasnt paying out as much she thought she would have to, she stuck 2k into lloyds shares @27p. They are almost 60p today. I think there will be more stories like this rather than financial ruin a few years later

Unless you are down sizing, then to go sticking in asking price offers and expecting the same for your house benefits absolutely no one in the chain.

sinbad182

How is your house sale going again MITSTM?!

lessonlearned

Interesting thread and some very revealing answers!!!!

Scaniarob - I feel that a gentleman's agreement should be honoured and it is heartening to see that a number of posters also agree with you.

I think it is shameful to go back on your word or when you have given a promise. A deal struck is a deal struck....

There is no harm, however, in allowing a second viewer to "register their interest". If the first proposed sale does not proceed to fruition then your second viewer can put in an offer.

Once you have accepted an offer, whether in writing or verbally you should keep your end of the bargain.

Failure to do so is not only morally wrong, it is also monumentally stupid.

Why do I say it's stupid. Because more often than not such tactics backfire. Even if they don't, and you get away with it, your good name and reputation will be sullied. It might not seem important but in the long term it will be.

A clear conscience and a good name are worth a great deal.

Call in Karma, call it moral justice or what you will. These things have a habit of levelling out in the long run.

Re - offering less than the asking price........

Why on earth not. An asking price is only ever a "guesstimate" - arriving at a valuation is not an exact science.

There is nothing immoral in offering £20K off an asking price of £200k or even £100k for that matter.

Everyone has a bottom line. The vendor asks a price, the buyer offers. The offer is accepted or rejected. The buyer may make a revised offer or not.

There is no reason for anyone to be insulted or offended at a lower than hoped for offer.

Whether the offer is lower than the Vendor had hoped for or not is irrelevant. Once that offer has been accepted the Vendor should not try to initiate a bidding war.

geoffky

You have done the right thing because if i as a buyer got wind of viewings after my offer had been accepted i would stitch you up like a kipper by pulling out hours before exchange....
You will get the extra mile out of your buyers if the deal hits snags.

moneyistooshorttomention

I'm keeping my "karmic bill" as a totally clean slate myself personally - so I won't have the situation where I've accepted someone stealing a bit of my house capital off me (not to put too fine a point upon it) by having accepted a stupid offer on my house.

I turned down an offer of £160k from an investor on my £170k house - rather than accept and keep trying for a more reasonable one myself.

I've been proven right at the price I set my house at - and in fact a bit of a "soft touch" to buyers as it is in that a similar house very near to mine has just sold for £170k (ie my asking price) and its one room smaller than mine and he looked shocked at me asking for that price for my (larger) house and told me my price is too low and the whole neighbourhood consensus is that my price is too low.

So - when you're already asking a price that is too low and have duly turned down a £10k lower offer (rather than accepting in theory - but not in practice) then you really have done everything you possibly can and can only sit back and wait (ie for the rest of those "new buy" houses to vanish off the market).

I've had further confirmation that in no way am I asking too much for my place by the fact that a house at the cheaper end of my street has just come up for sale at only slightly less than my price and they are cheaper area/older/rented/totally tatty can easily be seen from outside/the tenants are still living there.

So - with some of us - it really really IS the case that we aren't overcharging by any stretch of the imagination or doing anything that even a "house price thief" could regard as unethical.

I'll get my reward for being so "good" and so patient one day....;). I certainly have been known to turn positive cartwheels in order to make sure that I myself don't do anything unethical....