Offer made, now what? +MIP question

fiwen30

I’m sorry, you’re probably all sick of the sight of me! But my partner and I are both FTB, with no one we know personally to run silly questions & worries by, so here I am. Couple of questions about MIP and an offer made.

We’re an unmarried couple currently on 1 income, in County Down, NI. After meeting with a mortgage broker, we were told we can afford to borrow 100k, and we currently have 20k to cover a deposit. We’re looking at property up to 110k max with a 15% deposit, which will leave us some cash for immediate repairs/renovations/redecoration.

Viewed a house that came onto market last week, listed at 105k - chain-free and vacant, it was inherited by the seller, who has already gone through probate. EA said it had gone up for sale in Feb, but there turned out to be legal issues on the seller’s side - an historic boundary issue where a piece of land wasn’t transferred from next door to the for sale property properly. All has since been resolved.

At first viewing the EA told us there was a 95k offer on the house. We viewed a few different houses, still really liked the first, so had a second viewing on Tuesday. The house needs work doing even to our uneducated eyes - the downstairs windows to the rear of the house are single-glazed (2 kitchen windows, 1 living room window, and the back door); there is some damp in the corner of the kitchen at the rear of the house (2 exterior walls, under the single-glazed windows); the tiling on the bath is taped up around the shower end, and there is the same new carpet down on the stairs, landing, both bedrooms AND the bathroom, which makes me think it could have possibly been laid to replace/cover damp/water damage; there was also a patch of freshly plastered/painted wall in the front bedroom, a different corner of 2 external walls, down near the skirting board, fresh enough to leave plaster dust on my hands so a possible attempt at covering damp patches (unfortunately it was fine weather at both viewings, despite forecasts of rain!).

With this work/potential issues in mind, we put in an offer of 96k at about 4.30pm yesterday, over the phone. We would probably go up to 100k.
I informed the EA that we’re FTB, so no chain involved, we’ve only to give 30 days notice at our rented property, and that our offer is subject to mortgage approval.

Now, 2 questions -

1. Our mortgage broker came very well recommended by 2 good friends who used him when they were first time buyers. He seems like a good bloke, talked us through our options and answered a bunch of dumb questions, but when I handed over all our paperwork and asked if we’d receive a MIP to confirm the affordability calculation he’d given us, he said he ‘would put all that through at the same time as when the mortgage application goes in’, and that if any EA made noise over whether we could afford the offers we put in to just ‘give them [his] name and number and have them call [him]’, and he would confirm. Is this normal or standard practice? Maybe for NI? Everything I’ve read advises to get a MIP as proof of affordability, before you go about making offers, but he encouraged us to offer on anything we were interested in.
2. We put in our 96k offer over the phone, just before closing time yesterday. But...now what? How long do we wait to hear if the seller outright rejects, or is maybe considering our offer? There is a scarcity of property on the market within our area/price/requirement bracket, and we do really like the house, but we’re not desperate to move ASAP. Does the EA have to tell us if there are other offers, higher or lower than ours? Does the EA have to disclose the amount, and are they required to be truthful? Our mortgage broker is familiar with this EA, and claims he has a tendency to hype up the popularity/interest/offers made on a property, but once an offer has been officially made, do they have to be truthful about other offers? It would be annoying to be left out of the loop when we could go a bit higher if need be.

I’m used to being a capable, savvy person in most aspects of life, but this is all 100% new to both of us, and so I’m as nervous as a cat with kittens! Any advice and opinions are appreciated.

MovingForwards

1. That's normal, sod showing an EA how much you can borrow. Mine offered to speak with the EA if needed too.

2. You wait, but still keep looking at other properties. Just has to say there are other offers and usually they say they are higher. 

Sit tight, don't rush to increase offer just because you haven't heard anything. Be guided by your broker as they know the EA and their reputation!

fiwen30

So this is the house in question, interested to see if anyone has any thoughts or strong feelings about it - https://www.propertypal.com/13-victoria-gardens-millisle-road-donaghadee/579463

Haven't heard a peep from their EA. Telling myself that at least we didn’t get a call the next day rejecting the offer straight up, so it’s maybe still on the table? Again, we’d be willing to go up a little if we were shown that there were higher offers being given. This EA seems to list all his properties under ‘Offers Around £XXX‘, which seems strange - I’d thought that such phrasing was usually by picky sellers, rather then their EAs.

Not sure whether to call the EA ourselves and find out what the seller is thinking, or whether to keep sitting tight and hope we’ll be approached again if other offers are made/for a full and final offer?

kasqueak

House looks great and wow what a price! Where I live a house like that would be 300k minimum!  
it’s hard when waiting for a response from the estate agent. If the offer was rejected I would have thought you’d have heard straight away. So maybe the owner is mulling it over. Good luck with it!
my broker said the same thing when we were looking to buy recently - that the EA could call her if they were concerned about our affordability. Once our offer was accepted we then appointed a solicitor and proceeded to the full mortgage application. 

fiwen30

kasqueak said:

House looks great and wow what a price! Where I live a house like that would be 300k minimum!  
it’s hard when waiting for a response from the estate agent. If the offer was rejected I would have thought you’d have heard straight away. So maybe the owner is mulling it over. Good luck with it!
my broker said the same thing when we were looking to buy recently - that the EA could call her if they were concerned about our affordability. Once our offer was accepted we then appointed a solicitor and proceeded to the full mortgage application. 

Thanks kasqueak, it’s just boring and frustrating to have to sit twiddling our thumbs, not knowing if our offer is being considered, or if we need to increase. Not sure if we should be the ones chasing up the EA to find out what the seller is thinking, or if that’s rude and we should be waiting for them to reach out to us?

We’ve viewed a couple more in the meantime this week, but nothing else has caught our eye to make an offer.