Put in an offer on a house stiil no response

KaAsChEl

Hello all

We viewed a property on Monday evening it is up for £127,950. It is being sold because the couple are divorced and the property has to be sold. The man still lives in the house and the woman doesnt.
Anyway we placed an offer on Monday evening for £120,000, there is some work needed and we wanted to start low so we could increase the other without paying over the stamp duty threshold.
The agents said they would put the offer to owner and be in touch as soon as they hear. We didnt hear that night and I called them lunchtime today. They advised they havent been able to get in touch with the owner at the moment and said they would keep trying and would hopefully be able to speak to her today.
They called me at 3pm and said they deal with the woman and they think she is abroad which is why they cant get hold of her and they will keep trying but if they cant speak to her they will need to speak to the man.
So we still dont know and we are getting worried as they have more viewings at the end of the week.
We wanted to get an offer accepted and the property taken off the market.
Has anyone any experience with this? If they do accept our offer would they normally take it off the market and cancel the viewings?
It is really frustrating not knowing and we have our AIP in place and really want to get things moving and hopefully secure the property.

Thanks for reading

ognum

KaAsChEl wrote: »

Hello all

We viewed a property on Monday evening it is up for £127,950. It is being sold because the couple are divorced and the property has to be sold. The man still lives in the house and the woman doesnt.
Anyway we placed an offer on Monday evening for £120,000, there is some work needed and we wanted to start low so we could increase the other without paying over the stamp duty threshold.
The agents said they would put the offer to owner and be in touch as soon as they hear. We didnt hear that night and I called them lunchtime today. They advised they havent been able to get in touch with the owner at the moment and said they would keep trying and would hopefully be able to speak to her today.
They called me at 3pm and said they deal with the woman and they think she is abroad which is why they cant get hold of her and they will keep trying but if they cant speak to her they will need to speak to the man.
So we still dont know and we are getting worried as they have more viewings at the end of the week.
We wanted to get an offer accepted and the property taken off the market.
Has anyone any experience with this? If they do accept our offer would they normally take it off the market and cancel the viewings?
It is really frustrating not knowing and we have our AIP in place and really want to get things moving and hopefully secure the property.

Thanks for reading

Afraid you will just have to wait it out, nothing you can do to make it happen quicker, at least you have your present home that you ate not selling to live in.

eddddy

Hello KaAsChEl

I think it can help to look at things from the seller's perspective. If you were selling, and you had this offer, and you had more viewings booked for the end of the week - would you quickly accept the offer and cancel the remaining viewings?

Having said this, there could be many other reasons why you haven't heard.

I've heard more than one EA say that they don't pass on first offers for 24 hours, because very often the buyer can't stand the suspense and will phone back during that 24 hour period and increase their offer. (That happened to me when I was selling a few years back. The EA was chuckling as he explained how often that tactic worked.)

Yorkie1

The other thing which is relevant is that this is a divorcing couple. They will have to agree on everything - and this can take time.

witchy1066

same happened to us, we put an offer in, the EA even told us he thought it would be excepted and would ring us later that day,

no phone call , so the next day I rang them and he told me they had another viewing that morning and had offered slightly over our offer , was I willing to up the offer, I said no, if the venders had refused our first offer I was willing to go up but was not prepared to get in a bidding war ,
later that week my partner called into the EA office and was told the other offer was considerable more than ours ,

not saying this is the case with you but just an example of what does sometimes happen

lessonlearned

Viewed a property last Wednesday. Offered Thursday morning. Offer accepted today.

Don't be misled by Kirsty and Phil and their quick telephone calls, that is just TV. In real life these things take time.

Be patient, bide your time. I know it can be a nail biting time - especially for FTB's who are new and unsure how to proceed.

Your EA has your offer, has your contact details. Just sit tight now.

Don't keep phoning them because your anxiety may well come over as desperation. If you do find there are other offers in the pipeline you need to keep a cool head. You need thinking time.

If you appear too needy the EA and the Vendor will exploit this and play off one would be purchaser against the other.

This house I offered on is one for my son, a FTB. It has taken me all my negotiating and diplomatic skills to rein in his enthusiasm to ensure that he got a good deal and wasn't tempted to keep upping his offer. He has spent the last couple of evenings pacing up and down like a caged animal. :rotfl:

But, he did listen to my advice, I managed to calm him down and steer him through the process, coaching him and talking him through each step.

There were 2 other sets of people chasing this house. It was a probate house and the deceased's family were being very greedy. It could so easily have descended into an outright bidding war.

However, be keeping a cool head and being a bit savvy with his negotiating tactics he has managed to get the house at the asking price rather than paying more. Even the EA congratulated my son on the way he had handled the negotiations.

Keep calm, keep a clear head and don't panic. What's the worst that can happen. You lose the house.

There will be another one.

It might be an even better one.:rotfl:

yorkshire_terrier_owner

There are reasons why there is a delay, but in my experience, if buyers and sellers are motivated there need not be.

With the property I have recently sold, negotiations went back and forth but offer was agreed within an hour. With the property I bought, again, negotiations went back and forth but offer was agreed within 4 hours, and that was allowing for the fact that it was a couple I bought off and they were having to ring each other to discuss.

When I sold my parents house last year, we had had discussions before hand so we were all clear on what we would accept. When the offer came in, I was able to negotiate it without having to go back and forth to my parents and offer was agreed within a couple of hours.

Likewise with the property we purchased for my parents, offer agreed in half an hour.

If sellers are clear and know their numbers, there is no reason for it to drag on. It does because people haven't thought about it beforehand or there are problems such as divorcing couple, or people like playing games.

To be fair I am quite pushy and with all the properties I have offered on i have said "we have a deal by the end of the day or I walk away". And I have walked away. At offer stage I am also sussing out what they will be like to deal with in a business transaction and if they are wishy washy, I'm not interested. Whether it's right or wrong, that's the way I've always done it and its worked for me.

WestonDave

As you say they are dealing with the woman, who doesn't live in the house and therefore is motivated to sell to get her money out - but is abroad so not easily contactable. On the other hand the man is living in the house very nicely and is not motivated to sell so will use any excuse like its too much below asking to avoid agreeing to sell. This is a bit of a warning of what it will be like if this proceeds - he may well hold up every stage (even if just subtlely by taking 5 days to sign and return something rather than 1 day) as it drags out the time when he has to move out and find somewhere else to live. If you want this house then you'll need to grit your teeth and be prepared to wait out their domestic issues!

KaAsChEl

Just thought I would post the update.
Initial offer of £120,000 was declined we then upped our offer to £122,500 we then had to wait a good few days for a response, we were then informed that a similar offer had been made and the other buyers were in a similar position to us but out position was slightly more favourable. We then upped our offer again to £124,000.
We had to wait a few more days and found out the woman was happy to accept this and they had to contact the Mr as they both had to agree.
We had a call this morning and he has declined because apparently it's not enough!
The house is priced at £127,950, so realistically no one would want to pay over the stamp duty.
We are not sure what to do, should we leave it and wait a few days to see if he changes his mind?
Or should we call the agents to up out offer to £124,950 and explain that is the highest we will go to and if he declines this we will not leave the offer open. Realistically they won't get a better offer or someone in a much better position than us. If he does decline this then we know he is messing around and trying to hold up the sale of the house.
Any advice or opinions would be a great help!

Thanks

Dan-Dan

upping your offer by £950 is not going to make a blind bit of difference , you should leave your offer on the table and book further viewings to see other properties , preferably with the same EA

I reckon the guy doesnt even want to sell by the sounds of this

JennyW_2

Dan-Dan wrote: »

upping your offer by £950 is not going to make a blind bit of difference , you should leave your offer on the table and book further viewings to see other properties , preferably with the same EA

I reckon the guy doesnt even want to sell by the sounds of this

agree. don't make anymore calls. You've put forward very good offers. I would've probably taken your first one however some people can be stubborn

If it's not meant to be then so be it so get out looking again.

It's very frustrating but that's how it goes sometimes. We viewed a house in April which had been on the market for a year. Based on the age and condition of the property, work to be done etc, we gave 2 very good offers, both declined. We walked away. It's still on the market!