Offers on a rural Scottish property?!?

jessicagmail

We would like to offer on this house, however, we are stumped as to what to offer.

Can't link sorry!!
Rightmove Gateside, Beith offers over £250k


It's in Scotland, the Home Report has valued at £300k. It went on the market 3 months ago at offers over £285k but dropped to o/o £250k. The current owners paid £295k for it in 2007 and have done a lot of updating however I can't really find any comparable properties or sold prices. Closest is 2015:


What would you do?!?

-taff

Offer what you are happy to pay.

comeandgo

Be guided by your solicitor, they are involved in property all the time and will have an idea of prices.

jessicagmail

But do we offer ideal amazing price, happy price or absolute top end?

AdrianC

Offer the minimum the vendors will accept.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-47864823.html
Well, I wouldn't call it rural. In a village, a mile outside a 6,500 person town, 13 miles from Kilmarnock, 20 miles from Glasgow? That's DEFINITELY not rural by Scottish standards - easy commuter belt.

There's quite a few comparables in the £250-300k range, within a few miles of Beith.
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-59728324.html in particular makes this one look a bit overpriced.
2007 sale price is irrelevant. Ignore it.

glasgowdan

It's not a rural highland location, but it IS a rural property.

The price has dropped due to the area/location. Beith is quite scummy. Spend some time there first to see if you like it.

Location is good for access to various places. Glasgow, erskine bridge, Ayrshire coast are all quite handy.

ProDave

This is typical of the slow Scottish market at the moment where the higher end of the market is not moving. Which is why after 2 years we took ours off the market and are now letting it as we can't afford to drop the price any more.

Personally I think if you want rural you can do a lot better than that. That road looks like it has the potential to be busy which would bother me as I like peace and quiet.

But if it's the right house for you, offer £251K, that's "over 250" then they start negotiating.

I still don't think Scottish house prices have got back up to 2007 (peak) levels yet. Demand remains low for a number of reasons and prices remain depressed. We have totally missed out on the current "boom" much of England has had, and we are still oh so slowly crawling out of the 2008 house price recession.

comeandgo

I think the area could be the answer on not selling. Two houses near me were bought within a week with full price agreed, and an increase of £50k from one the same sold two years ago.

davidmcn

ProDave wrote: »

But if it's the right house for you, offer £251K, that's "over 250" then they start negotiating.

I wouldn't feel obliged to start at over £250k. "Offers over" often means "open to offers under too".

Even if I wanted to buy in the area, two immediate negative points are the main road location, and the oil heating (I'm guessing there's no mains gas there?).

jessicagmail

There's no mains gas and it is a busy road, though there are talks of a bypass. I feel that's a little irrelevant for us though as we are ok with both these things.

We were definitely not going to offer over £25k and in fact have decided our top offer is below that too.

Many thanks for your responses. X

ProDave

3 months is a very short time to drop the price so much. Have they had any viewings at all?