Asking prices and offers

gemaface

MattinLondon wrote: »

We are looking in East London (zone 3-4) and everything I'm calling about is sold already, so not even able to see anything yet. I take it that it's common practice to leave all the old ads on the property sites to entice people to call the EAs? Certain EAs have several listed, but when you call they say they're all sold. Bit of a pain...

Ha! Yes, you'll quickly learn that estate agents leave lots of properties online to drum up custom - even when they have long sold. Your best bet if using Zoopla/Right Move etc is to include a date range in your search so you filter out all the rubbish. There is nothing more irritating then chasing down an estate agent to find the property of your dreams is not for sale! Also, sign up to all the estate agents websites and get them to email you when new properties come on. You have to be quick off the mark to get a viewing!

pcgtron

I own a flat in North London. It's not on the market and I have no reason to put it on.
However, it's yours for £500,000.

It's worth about £300,000 in the current market but the way it's going, it will be worth 500,000 in a couple of years.
Interested?

[Deleted User]

Its boom time down south but wouldn't exactly say they are flying off the shelves elsewhere, we sold ours under asking after dropping a little, on market for 5 months and just agreed to buy on one which has been on market for 20 months and got it well under their initial asking price in Durham. Nice if your selling in London but not nice if your buying...

Green3

Boom time would be an under-statement! When a property came on rightmove, I immediately called the estate agent to ask to view it. He said he would call me back. Then I was told that someone had knocked on the door and offered above asking price and the owner had accepted! Even the estate agent was put off because this was done before he could even arrange one single viewing. He himself said that he had a go at the owner for doing this.

I would never be able to go knocking on people's doors like this. Who can compete with such extremely aggressive buyers with money and no scruples?

Mrs_Z

You need also to register with the Estate Agents. When we were looking, we would receive property details via e-mail before they were published on Rightmove. Our EA equally was not very quick marking our property as 'sold' on Rightmove - in fact it appeared available for a good 3 weeks afterwards after we had accepted an offer and the property that we are in the process of buying still appears as available on Rightmove.