Early offer before open day?

Mrswoody2016

Hi everyone

Just wondered if anyone had any advice please. We are first time buyers, with a mortgage in principle. We've found what looks to be our perfect property. There is an open day on 27th but as I am working on that day, we managed to get an early viewing directly with the owners this Saturday. The property is on for offers over £340k and our maximum is £343,500. The estate agent has told us that if we put in an early bid the seller won't cancel the open day. Of course we don't know whether this is true as can't always trust estate agents. The seller has found their perfect property so we are guessing they may be in a hurry to sell. Is it worth talking to the seller on Saturday to ask if they are taking bids early, and if they received the bid they're looking for, would they cancel the open day and take it off the market? If they say yes and we make an offer but they don't accept it, are we then just setting the bar for all the other viewings at the open day? Is it better to wait until after the open day but risk them accepting another offer from someone else that may have seen it and taking it off the market. As its ' offers over' and we only have £3.5k over, we probably aren't in the strongest position so not holding out too much hope anyway. The house is fresh on the market and in a hightly competitive area. Any help much appreciated! thank you!!!

ognum

Mrswoody2016 wrote: »

Hi everyone

Just wondered if anyone had any advice please. We are first time buyers, with a mortgage in principle. We've found what looks to be our perfect property. There is an open day on 27th but as I am working on that day, we managed to get an early viewing directly with the owners this Saturday. The property is on for offers over £340k and our maximum is £343,500. The estate agent has told us that if we put in an early bid the seller won't cancel the open day. Of course we don't know whether this is true as can't always trust estate agents. The seller has found their perfect property so we are guessing they may be in a hurry to sell. Is it worth talking to the seller on Saturday to ask if they are taking bids early, and if they received the bid they're looking for, would they cancel the open day and take it off the market? If they say yes and we make an offer but they don't accept it, are we then just setting the bar for all the other viewings at the open day? Is it better to wait until after the open day but risk them accepting another offer from someone else that may have seen it and taking it off the market. As its ' offers over' and we only have £3.5k over, we probably aren't in the strongest position so not holding out too much hope anyway. The house is fresh on the market and in a hightly competitive area. Any help much appreciated! thank you!!!

If it's a competitive market and I was the seller I would keep the open day, you will still offer come what may.

I would ask on the viewing at what price they would be remove it from the market, if it's way over your price then don't offer then.

The problem is certainly in the area I live that the EAs price low to get the foot fall and then the price shoots up so it could go way over your price.

Good luck!

dc197

If you like the house, offer. You can ask them to cancel the other viewings if they accept, but don't expect acceptance if you don't offer at least askon price.
Better to offer sooner rather than later I think.

ognum

dc197 wrote: »

If you like the house, offer. You can ask them to cancel the other viewings if they accept, but don't expect acceptance if you don't offer at least askon price.
Better to offer sooner rather than later I think.

I really dont agree, if it's a busy market and you offer early you simply bench mark for people to offer over your bid.

Hold back unless you can find out the price they will accept to withdraw from market.

worried_jim

The open house next to me got 5% more than asking price. First people to turn up offered asking price before getting inside. Everything here now has open days, there would be nothing in it for the seller to take it off with only three days to go- they have nothing to lose.

Hope you get it.

dc197

Ognum, yes good point.
But it sounds like he cannot have that luxury, he cannot make the open day, and that's the obvious time an acceptable offer would come. So if he delays he will lose the chance, at least in a fast maket.

AnotherJoe

I agree with Jim, you'd think there's no incentive for the seller to take it off the market. Maybe if the open house was a month away, sure, but not if its a few days.

However, you never can tell, we went to an open house viewing on a Saturday , decided to wait until the Monday so we didn't appear too keen, on the Monday made an asking price offer and were told the seller had accepted an offer £2k below the asking price on the Saturday, eg they didn't wait to see what other offers came in over a few days, which seems wholly irrational to me, why not wait a short while to have all the offers come in? Anyway, we raised our offer by £2k and we told the seller was sticking to their initial purchaser.

Lucky for us they did since we then found a much better house next week that we ended up buying. About 2 weeks after finding the better house, the EA for property one came back and said the first deal had fallen through were we still interested.

So, my point of this long winded story is, maybe your seller doesn't fancy an open house and would be happy to take it off and be done with it even though you'd think that makes no sense.

If it turns out to be really popular there will be a bidding contest anyway, so I don't think you've actually got anything to lose. Tell them you are FTB, mortgage approved no chain, will pay asking price if taken off the market before OH.

And second point is, if they don't do that, then phone on the day and make an asking price offer anyway.

Good luck

barbiedoll

Go and see the house on Saturday and if you really do want it, make an offer to the sellers there and then. Seeing the sellers in person, and by yourselves, may just swing the deal, especially if you wax lyrical about their good taste and their wonderful decor etc etc. Some (not all) vendors are led by their hearts and not their heads, they may accept your offer because they like you. Do make sure that you tell them that it is your absolute top offer, and maybe say that you wouldn't normally go straight in with the full amount but that you've fallen in love with the house. Make it personal!

Obviously, this wouldn't work with all vendors. But when we viewed our house, (in a fevered market), we made friends with the vendors dog, we let our cute, well-behaved (for a change!) toddler loose to work his magic, and we had a natter with the next door neighbour on the way out (they were good friends with the vendor.) We couldn't match the asking price, we were around £1500 short and we told the vendor so. We found out that she accepted our offer simply because she "liked us", and her neighbour said that she wanted to live next door to us. It's got to be worth a punt and some of us just hate dancing to the EA's tune.

Good luck on Saturday!

Grenage

It's a good technique in the current market; have an open day with no advance viewings a few weeks after it goes live on RM, list the guide price at reasonable-low, and watch 10+ couples bid off each other after Single viewing.

Having no chain is a bonus, and most sellers find it to be a great attraction. Offer 340 on the day; up it to your max when it goes to final offers

The seller would be mental to cancel the opening day; they could get tens of thousands over asking.

Mrswoody2016

Thanks so much to everyone for their advice and good luck - so helpful!

One of the things we are worried about is !!!!ing off the EA. They've done us a favour getting us in for an early viewing and made it clear not to bother asking them to cancel the open day. If we go direct to seller and ask, I imagine the EA might blacklist us and not be so keen on getting us viewings for future properties. They're the biggest EA in the area so we need to keep them on side. If the open day does get cancelled I guess it looks bad on EA.

At the moment I think our tactic is...
1. View on Saturday, be enthusiastic and make sure the owners like us and want to sell to us
2. Ask them when they are starting to accept offers and if they did receive an offer they liked; would they consider cancelling the open day. I don't think we will ask what price they'd take it off for, seems a bit too direct and putting them on the spot, plus it may be way higher than we can offer.
3. Tell them that we don't want to miss out on the chance to bid as we do really like it and we've wanted to live on their street for a while
4. Go to the estate agents straight after to tell them we are very keen and we'll be putting an offer in (either there and then if the owner seems keen; or after the open day)
5. Hope for the best!

Eeeeek!!!! Seem like a good plan?!?

kiddy_guy

It's a plan and it's the best one you've got. Plan B is to hold back and hope there are no other offers.

However if I was the EA, knowing how desperate you are, would be to hold the open day irrespective, knowing what you're a safe fall back position. I'd be very clear yours is a best and final offer and subject to the cancellation of open day. Make sure you tell them it's subject to the cancellation before you tell them the offer. If they still refuse, don't offer. I'd then wait to see how the offers fall before showing my hand.

Unless you can find more money if this house is sought after then you're going to struggle. Alternatively it may be that the EA is just having an open day to drum up business as it's going to be a difficult sell. Though what you're saying seems to indicate that the vendor is going
to beating buyers off with a stick.