House prices, emotions and 'pressure'

Conrad

The Hertfordshire market;


Understand that through most of the county a 1 bed flat will set you back £200k+ and rapidly rising, with the occasional exception due to such things as a short lease.


In Hertford I recently saw £400k 1 beds and in Bishops Stortford (nowhere near as expensive as areas just outside the M25), I saw a small development of 2 bed flats at £750k each.


So your houses in Stevenage seem good value still even though it is a bit of a windy new town.


Go all the way out to dreary places like St Neots and Biggleswade and 1 beds are rapidly approaching and breaching £200k

edinburgher

robcyb wrote: »

Sorry - must have missed this. I agree with the sentiment behind this, however I would argue (to an extent) that the value of an object is almost certainly judged on its merits? Value can be a loose term, and is quite often dictated by trends (backed by real data) and with 'gut feel' of what someone feels is what that given thing is worth, or indeed what someone might be prepared to pay. I appreciate that EAs have been doing this for quite some time, but again the condition of many properties and the many variables that affect it's 'value' are quite varying and are sometimes not truly reflective.

We went with the 10% under not necessarily as a hard-and-fast rule, but because this was the normalised value that previous properties in the area had sold for (based on land registry data). We then subsequently improved offers up to 4% under asking, only to then be told no full asking only. With the properties having been on the market for 3+ months and having been told by the EAs that no offers were received to date that this was more or less an invitation to test the waters.

I am not sure if this is a Scotland only thing, but don't you have a valuation included with the home report? It's a standard thing up here. I was thinking of surveyor 'valuation' vs. price EA estimates that they can get you, although there's usually similarity between the two.

edinburgher

Conrad wrote: »

The Hertfordshire market;


Understand that through most of the county a 1 bed flat will set you back £200k+ and rapidly rising, with the occasional exception due to such things as a short lease.


In Hertford I recently saw £400k 1 beds and in Bishops Stortford (nowhere near as expensive as areas just outside the M25), I saw a small development of 2 bed flats at £750k each.


So your houses in Stevenage seem good value still even though it is a bit of a windy new town.


Go all the way out to dreary places like St Neots and Biggleswade and 1 beds are rapidly approaching and breaching £200k

I usually find Conrad to be a bit of a loony when I'm on this particular board, but this had me nodding along, loved the 'Malcolms'!

It's not just EAs, vendors feel this way as well. I couldn't help but find the chancers who tried to shave a couple of thousand off the price of something that was costing £££,£££ with silly reasoning to be a pain in the backside.

I might have changed my tune if it had been a buyer's market! :rotfl:

AirJoe

I looked for about a year (some unfortunate vendor problems) before finally buying near Brighton. It became apparent very quickly that, despite the slowdown in London, that was very much not the case for my area. The ripple effect just outside of Brighton was insane! The delays in my buying probably added £20-30k to the price of my flat (£175k for a 2 bed flat that needed a fair amount of superficial work in Worthing, for those interested).

I believe the economic model has permanently changed with regards the housing market and the rich/poor divide. I wouldn't be surprised if bridging the gap from non owner to owner only gets harder in the future.

I've also found there are certain intangibles from owning a home that you can't really put a price on. The security and control being the big ones. If you manage to find somewhere you would be happy to stay for a while it mitigates a lot of the risks (the market always goes up over a long enough period). For me, that all adds up to very little downside, whatever the market does.

I'm the paralysis by analysis type and take it from me; take the plunge and don't get too caught up in finding a one in a million bargain. You'll only ending up regretting that you missed out on nice house by £5k, which on reflection you'd have gladly paid.

[Deleted User]

robcyb wrote: »

We have been told be EAs that Stevenage is now 'sought after' by Londoners as the properties are 'cheap' in comparison - which would explain to an extent what you've mentioned. Our concern however is that this trend continues - even post-brexit. It's a catch-22 situation really. If house prices drop significantly enough, sellers are likely to not sell because of potential of negative equity - unless of course they are forced to (interest rate rises, etc.)

I guess the question is more along the lines of 'how long is a piece of string'.

I live down the A1 from you, and Stevenage is where people's kids are now looking for houses in Stevenage (and the surrounding towns) because they're priced out of our village. Here you need £400-440k+ for a 3 bed semi. 5 years ago it was £300k. We are a satellite village of St. Albans

This trend is going to continue. Your area is 'cheap' in comparison to many of the surrounding ones

Conrad

AirJoe wrote: »

I'm the paralysis by analysis type and take it from me; take the plunge and don't get too caught up in finding a one in a million bargain. You'll only ending up regretting that you missed out on nice house by £5k, which on reflection you'd have gladly paid.

Yes at times I am a Malcolm when the mood takes me, but it invariably results in me coming away with nothing but a bunch of wasted time and energy and a bunch of 'research' paper for the bin.

Conrad

ringo_24601 wrote: »

I live down the A1 from you, and Stevenage is where people's kids are now looking for houses in Stevenage (and the surrounding towns) because they're priced out of our village. Here you need £400-440k+ for a 3 bed semi. 5 years ago it was £300k. We are a satellite village of St. Albans

This trend is going to continue. Your area is 'cheap' in comparison to many of the surrounding ones

I was around Cuffley Ridgeway the other day and a number of close locations, and the wealth and property on display is just staggering

ukcarper

I bought my first house in early 70s and had similar problems to you in so much as property prices were increasing very quickly. I started looking at the beginning of year at the time I was living 20 miles outside London just inside where m25 is now. A friend of mine lived 20 miles further out but I wa very reluctant to move out, at the time the houses started at £5.5k. After being guzumpted a couple of times and then failing to get a mortgage on a flat because of the mortgage valuation, I took the plunge and bought the house further out this was May and I paid £8k the mortgage was for the absolute maximum I could borrow, in fact it was much higher than the normal 3x + 1x salary mortgages of the time. Property carried on increasing that year teaching a peak of £11k early the following year when they fell back. If I had not bought when I did I would not have been able to buy and it would have been sometime before I could. I sold 9 years later I can't remember what I got but it I think it was about £16k.

I think that if you are intending to stay for a reasonable length of time it's best to buy when you can if you don't you might not be able to buy at all, if you buy and prices fall you might kick yourself because you could have save a few thousand but in the long term you are unlikely to make a loss. You have to ask yourself what's worse not being able to buy or kicking yourself because you have spent a few thousand more than you could have.

[Deleted User]

Conrad wrote: »

I was around Cuffley Ridgeway the other day and a number of close locations, and the wealth and property on display is just staggering

Oh I know there, I've taken my son to the Tolmers Scout Camp

Yep, the place did look nice. Still, nothing can beat the school run through Radlett. I don't bother getting excited about Bentleys and Aston Martins anymore

Now interestingly, my dad had a job offer back in the 1970s with Rolls Royce in Watford - and he didn't take it because he couldn't afford a house in the area. I now live about 2 miles from where he was looking and they live in North Manchester.

My view on the cost is... i've you're not sniffy about the first £250k of the price, why get sniffy about a few grand here and there? I was a bit merciless when I sold our last house as I pushed our sellers to give an extra £2k on a £220k house. I just needed it to cover some of the costs of moving. Glad they didn't make a fuss about it. So when it came to buying our current place, I tried to push the price down a bit, and they wanted £5k over our initial offer - so I let them have it.

In the end, the £222k house is now worth £360k, so it was worth them 'putting out'.

So.. don't quibble about the last few k. Worry more about the first several hundred.

Herzlos

Long term house prices are always likely to go up, so I'd be inclined to make an asking price offer if they'll accept that and you can afford it. The £12k different will be insignificant in 10 years, and as soon as you go from renting to buying you can put more money into paying it off.

By all means start low, but be aware of the bigger picture.

If you're expecting the market to dive (I didn't, and 10 years on my house is only worth 85% of what I paid) then hold off a bit, but the advice I was given was to just get on the ladder first.