How to approach the lanlord to buy the house

trsv

Hello all,
Hoping for some advice and ideas.
TL;DR: how to approach the landlord to ask him whether he would sell us the house.

We are first time buyers & have agreement in principal.
We are looking for properties in the area we are currently living, but after few viewings I've come to realise the house we are renting at the moment is actually a good choice if it were for sale.

Some additional info: the area is sought after and the houses sell for significant sums (for this part of the country/city). Houses on the same street sell for different prices, depending on their state 20-30k difference. My husband is not so thrilled by the idea as the house isn't ideal and requires some work to be done, but I do like it.The house needs part replacing the central heating & boiler as it is still with Baxi Bermuda one and not very heating effective. The kitchen might do with some work, as obviously the landlord put it himself & it could've been done better. Nothing major though apart from the CH.

How do we approach the landlord to inquire whether he would be interested in selling the house to us? If he were to sell it this would save us the massive pain to move once again plus we could do any work the house requires in our own time. I am not sure how much is the market value of the house - while I want to offer a fair price, it obviously is not OK to ask EA to evaluate the property as it isn't ours; then again if the landlord agreed to sell and the price was too high and we can't afford it, what if he then proceeds to sell it and we have to leave, no house & no rented place?

I am wondering how should I approach the landlord - send him a letter? Show up unannounced at his doorstep? (probably not the best of ideas) What should I include? I read the following being proposed:

Hi,
I'm your tenant at 23 Smith St. I love it here, and would like to buy the property form you. Are you interested in selling? I'm happy to buy it in "as-is" condition, if that helps.
Jane
[contact info]

and a proposed message in case of refusal

No problem - if your situation changes, please keep me in mind. I hope I can remain a tenant in the future, but I am looking to buy. I'll try to give as much notice as possible.

It looks a bit abrupt to me though. Any words of wisdom or experience with this? TIA

anselld

trsv wrote: »

My husband is not so thrilled by the idea as the house isn't ideal and requires some work to be done, but I do like it.

Surely it would be better to look for somewhere you are both keen on (and which is actually for sale).

shopaholicz

My mum used to have a house that she rented out. She was thinking of selling it for about 4 years before she actually did. This was because she was waiting for the tenant to move out. My son then moved in and looked after it till it sold. She would have been really pleased if the tenant had offered to buy, it would have saved her a lot of hassle. Just be honest and approach the landlord.

Do you have their phone number? They can only say no, they can't kick you out or anything and once you've asked if they'd be interested in selling you will know where you stand and can make further plans from there.

theartfullodger

trsv wrote: »

........... - send him a letter? Show up unannounced at his doorstep? (probably not the best of ideas) What should I include? I read the following being proposed:

Hi,
I'm your tenant at 23 Smith St. I love it here, and would like to buy the property form you. Are you interested in selling? I'm happy to buy it in "as-is" condition, if that helps.
Jane
[contact info]

and a proposed message in case of refusal

No problem - if your situation changes, please keep me in mind. I hope I can remain a tenant in the future, but I am looking to buy. I'll try to give as much notice as possible.

It looks a bit abrupt to me though. Any words of wisdom or experience with this? TIA

Aye, give that a go:

Be aware that when he sells he will likely be liable to CGT (as it's not his home) and it may be "worth" more rented out than it would be sold..

Fosterdog

We recently made an offer to our landlord, after some back and forth of him asking for a lot more than we were willing to pay he agreed to get it properly valued. The valuation came in 1.5k-5k less than we had offered but he still wanted 10k more than we offered and if he put it on the open market wants to ask 20k more than we offered. A week later another house in the same street went on the market, it is in much better condition than the one we are in after being fully gutted and renovated 10 years ago. We've had an offer accepted at just 1k more than we had offered our landlord and we will get a much better house for our money.

I would say go ahead with the offer but don't get you heart set on it and look around at other houses. We didn't really want to move as this has been our home for six years and we are settled but we had to be realistic about how much the house is actually worth.

AnotherJoe

trsv wrote: »

My husband is not so thrilled by the idea as the house isn't ideal and requires some work to be done, but I do like it.

Perhaps sort that out first before discussing the minutea of how to approach the landlord !!

And if you do then go ahead with a letter, for goodness sake dont put "I love the house" you might as well write "please add an extra £10k onto what you think its worth".

Nor do you need to state "as is condition" - whats the alternative? You'd like him to put a new bathroom and kitchen in first? Or the survey discovers it needs a new roof? Where's your bargaining position because his will be "sorry you said as is and that means with half the roof tiles missing"

If you do bludgeon your husband into putting an offer forward, then I'd get some estate agents round and ask for a valuation, then write to landlord and simply state "we are considering buying a house in the locality in the future, do you have any plans to sell this one because if so perhaps we could come to an agreement and split the value of EA's fees plus you would have a simple chain free sale? If you arent considering this right now we are happy to remain as tenants and please let us know should your position change"

Cakeguts

Does your landlord have other rented properties? If so he might not want to sell any of them.

kinger101

If one of you isn't keen now, I can't see the point in buying it (even if it were for sale). Notifying LL of your intention to buy somewhere in the near future carries it's own risk, particularly if meddling letting agents are involved. If they can, they might ask you to sign a new fixed term contract.

Hoploz

A quick one-liner would be best, along the lines of 'Are you considering selling this house?'

If you appear super-keen he might just think you're willing to pay extra to not have to move. After all, if he sells it to someone else it won't make any difference to him - he isn't the one trying to save any upheaval!

Best to keep looking elsewhere then when you find something just ask out of interest as a comparison perhaps.

Mojisola

trsv wrote: »

after few viewings I've come to realise the house we are renting at the moment is actually a good choice if it were for sale.

My husband is not so thrilled by the idea as the house isn't ideal and requires some work to be done, but I do like it.

You like the house; your husband doesn't.

Isn't that a good reason for looking elsewhere?

How would you feel if he wanted to buy a house you weren't happy with?

trsv

Thank you all for the answers, they are really helpful.
Let's just say my husband is not so realistic what we can get for our money in this neighborhood I'm the one in the family doing the research and from it and the viewings we've done so far, as we are indeed looking at other houses as well, I can clearly see that if this house was offered for a reasonable price, it would be a good choice.
I'm not solely counting on it as our only choice, I was just thinking if it were for sale, it would save us a lot of hassle.
I don't know whether the landlord has other properties; he lives on the street next to us and the previous tenant said she never had any trouble with him. I haven't seen him in person and the EA is nightmarish slow and ineffective when trying to communicate re repairs etc.