Negotiating a purchase price

MysteryMe

What they paid for it is irrelevant. It is how it stacks up against similar properties that have sold recently that is more relevant. You know what the magic number is, if you think it is overpriced at £298,000 then walk away. You can't force them to sell it to you, they can't force you to buy it.

GDB2222

cajef wrote: »

The choice is you offer them the price they are asking or walk away if they are not willing to accept any lower offers.

We were not in any hurry to sell our last property in fact we agreed we would not move unless we got a certain minimum price, we held out and eventually got what we were asking.

I’d just point out that that strategy works when house prices are rising. Essentially, the market catches up with your minimum price. The snag is that the place you move to gets more expensive.

Crashy_Time

GDB2222 wrote: »

I’d just point out that that strategy works when house prices are rising. Essentially, the market catches up with your minimum price. The snag is that the place you move to gets more expensive.

Very true, the strategy doesn`t work well at all in declining markets.

johnathan45

Ask a mate of yours to put a lowball offer of £285k. Your offer will look better in comparison.
It'll be funny if they accept your mate's offer though!

Thrugelmir

Jay_En_Gee wrote: »

Any advice on how I should play this?

Look elsewhere while leaving your offer open on the table.

hazyjo

I was in a similar situation a couple of years ago. Am sure there was no more than around £4k between my highest offer and what they would take (asking price). I dug my heels in as I had a backup house (the one I bought and am very happy in now).


Someone did eventually buy it. You can't make someone drop their price. Be friendly and hope that they like you, show a bit of personality - that's the only advice I can give. We really liked the vendors of that house, had a laugh and joke with them, viewed twice and were greeted like old friends, and it obviously didn't make any difference, but sometimes emotional heartstrings can be tugged. That sounds a bit coldhearted - it's not meant to be lol.

conradmum

You're getting bogged down in details. It doesn't matter what you think the house is worth. All that matters is what you're willing to pay for it. If you aren't prepared to go over your current offer, start looking elsewhere.

SmashedAvacado

If I buy a diamond ring for a tenner at a car boot sale should I sell it to the diamond dealer for less than its worth because I got a bargain?

The property is worth what it's worth. From a negotiation perspective you know their bottom price, but you could probably go back with 297k and get it. you could also offer the 298 and then pay for a good survey which might reveal reasons why the shiny new extension isn't as great as all that leading you to revise your bid down once they are a bit more committed to you as a buyer.

As others have said, not worth losing the perfect house over a small bit of cash if you can afford what they want. Just because they have made good money on it, doesn't make it a bad deal for you.

Crashy_Time

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Look elsewhere while leaving your offer open on the table.

But if the market declines further after the GE be sure to make an even lower offer to account for "market changes", the seller will get the message eventually.

Thrugelmir

Crashy_Time wrote: »

But if the market declines further after the GE be sure to make an even lower offer to account for "market changes", the seller will get the message eventually.

The market will pick up again in the Spring.