Can we reduce our house price offer?

housemouse101

Hi,

Myself and boyfriend viewed a house on the weekend, and put in offer of full asking price straight after second viewing. We really like the house but having had a day or two to think, now feel we may have jumped the gun and are now looking at paying much more than the house is worth. We regret not starting the bid lower. The asking price is 155k, the actual value is probably lower, may be down to 145k. They were really friendly people and I think a combination of them selling their two houses to buy one together (they have excess furniture), and them wanting to sell to us as first time buyers (we have no property waiting to be sold and they want to get a move on) means they greed to leave a number of items including fridge freezer, sofa, oven, washing machine, dryer, lawn mower (we sort of have this in writing via estate agent).

Do we have any room for offering a lower asking price (150k)? And how would we go about this? What are the risks? Chances of them declining?

I'm aware that 'gazundering' is a !!!! move and it's not our intention to waste the sellers time or play games. This is a genuine question and a mistake on our part due to inexperience.

House was built in '74 and not expecting the survey to come back with anything major that would require much of a reduction.

Also for context we are probably looking at staying in this house for a long time, so resale is not on our minds. And the house is mostly well decorated and move-in ready. I think we were willing to pay a bit extra for the convenience.

Thanks for any help

Alter_ego

Of course you can reduce your offer before exchange. The vendor can of course refuse your new offer.

Dan-Dan

Oh dear.....

What have you based your `new` price on ?

Donnel

There is no issue negotiating. You can go like, after thinking over, we had a feeling that the price of the house is higher by a tiny bit.
List out the reasons why u get a lower value for the house when calculated. Convince them, to make a slight adjustment. You should not later regret, so asking now is the best choice.

Dan-Dan

Donnel wrote: »

There is no issue negotiating. You can go like, after thinking over, we had a feeling that the price of the house is higher by a tiny bit.
List out the reasons why u get a lower value for the house when calculated. Convince them, to make a slight adjustment. You should not later regret, so asking now is the best choice.

Best to be up front and honest ASAP but i dont think listing reasons their house isnt worth the offer is good advice

emmatthews

Why do you now feel the house is worth less?

If I was the seller & the local market was good then I would choose to re market the house if someone did this to me. Unless it is as the result of a survey issue I think it is bad form to gazunder & as a seller I would also worry that the buyer would do it again closer to exchange.

DRP

Have they actually accepted your asking price offer?

If they have accepted it, then i agree with dan-dan

Dan-Dan wrote: »

Best to be up front and honest ASAP but i dont think listing reasons their house isnt worth the offer is good advice

I can't imagine it will make you very popular with the vendor, so you need to consider the risk that they may lose confidence in you as a buyer and either say no, or just remarket the property.

Dan-Dan

Plus....possibility of the estate agent treating you with utmost caution on any further offers you make on other properties.....and in a small town this could be pretty damaging

oystercatcher

It depends how fast property is moving in your area, but if I was your seller then I would remarket to someone else if you did this. I quite simply wouldn't trust you and property sells fast around here.

How much do you want that particular house? If it is perfect and you intend to stay there a long time it could be worth a little extra?

Grenage

Post a link the property, and you'll get opinions on value.

If you are going to get cold feet on the price, the time to do it is now.

housemouse101

Thank you so much for your advice everyone. Will consider very carefully whether to ask to lower the offer by the end of today.

They accepted the offer immediately.

It's not necessarily that we think the house it worth less, more that the asking prices are normally inflated and in the midst of falling in love with it we hadn't really accounted for this.

Currently thinking that while we may be paying a little over the odds, we can afford it and it's probably worth it overall. Plus its in good condition etc etc so someone else would probably snap it up anyway.