Selling shared ownership house

MKwife

Can anyone please advise me on behalf of my friend?

He bought a house (shared ownership) with a housing association. He is now looking to sell his share of the house. The housing association have valued the house and he has had the house valued by an estate agent.

The problem is that the estate agent have valued the house much higher than the housing association, and when he informed them they told him he had to go with their valuation even though the estate agents valued it much higher.

Where does he stand with this as he does own half the house, and of course he wants to sell it for as much as he can get.

Any ideas?

brazilianwax

When I sold mine it was the same (but the agent and the HA valued it the same).

Surely he's better off - the HA will want their percentage on the lower amount = more profit for him. Or am I missing something?

MKwife

It was valued at £15,000 more by the estate agents. Would he not have made more profit if it was sold for £15,000 more by the estate agents?

Richard_Webster

You really must look at the terms of your shared ownership arrangement. In a lot of cases if you haven't bought the whole 100% you can only sell it to someone on the HA's list in this case for the 70% of the value that the HA has set - there may be some mechanism for appealing against this valuation but you would need to look at the lease or other documentation.

In some cases, increasingly less these days, you can do a back to back sale of the whole 100% paying the HA 30% of what they think it is worth from the money you get from the buyer. Lots of shared ownership leases I see these days contain a booby trap to stop using the buyer's money to buy the 100%. They put wording in that effectively means that you have to have owned the 100% for 3 months before you can sell it.

All this detail should have been explained when you bought the place - it really will depend upon the terms and you may not be able to sell it on the open market!

As a conveyancing solicitor I believe the information given in the post to be useful but I accept no liability except to fee-paying clients

CYBERCIDERSAVER

Of course th Estate agent has probably put a premium on the house price for 2 reasons.


1. they always want your custom so will give you a high valuation to get your custom. Is this the only EA valuation that you had???? maybe get some more to see the difference.

2. usually there is a negotiating perccentage in an EA valuation. in the HA valuation there won't be.

MrsTom

You can pay for an independant valuation which I believe costs £240. I am looking to buy the other half of my shared ownership flat and my housing association won't accept an Estate agents valuation for the very reason that it can be overpriced and it isn't fair to you, I have to pay for the independant valuation but then it means that it is priced fairl

MKwife

Update.

He has informed me that the 28 days is up so would he now be free to sell through an estate agents now?

brazilianwax

What 28 days??

He should be looking at the original SO agreement to see what the rules are.

lynzpower

all depends on the terms in his lease.

They vary hugely. itys best for him to read his lease then he will know.