Estate agent asking for bids in increments of £5,000.... why?

mrschaucer

ailskearney said:

The asking price is £435,000. So we were first to bid and offered asking. Yesterday I was informed that there had been another viewing and they had offered £240,000 and that bids now have to be in increments of £5,000. We have a current bid of £245,000. 

Um, you might just want to have a look at those figures ...

eddddy

ailskearney said:

The asking price is £435,000. So we were first to bid and offered asking. Yesterday I was informed that there had been another viewing and they had offered £240,000 and that bids now have to be in increments of £5,000. We have a current bid of £245,000. 

The bids don't have to be in increments of £5,000.

The EA wants you to bid in £5,000 increments, but you don't have to do what the EA wants, if you don't want to. (Just like if the EA wants you to stand on one leg - you don't have to do it if you don't want to.)

If you want to bid in smaller increments, just go ahead and do it.

eddddy

ailskearney said:

The estate agent had refused an offer that wasn’t an increase of £5,000. The OP bid £250,000 this morning so we are now sitting on £255,000. Increasing at a fast pace. 

The estate agent would be breaking the law if they refused your offer - they must pass all offers to the seller (unless the seller has given them specific instructions not to, which seems unlikely).

It sounds a bit like the estate agent is just trying to bully you into doing what suits them best. It's up to you whether you do what they want or not.

Jumblebumble

blue_max_3 said:

Jumblebumble said:

The OP will know nothing of the sort
How would they know if someone else had offered £4500 ?
PS the vendor is not going to turn down an offer of £4500 unless he is an imbecile

Well, if the OP pays 5k more, the offer of 4,5k is effectively rejected. You might ask, wouldn't they just go to the full 5k if rejected. But anyway, it seems likely the strategy may encourage bigger jumps in the offers made. Whether that results in a sale is another matter altogether.

Indeed but in my scenario the OP has then  not "overpaid"  by £5K as asserted  but by £500
I would not follow the herd and would bid £3K as this would probably crack the deal if no one else bid the 5K and I would save 2K
As stated I suspect the vendor is unlikely to watch an extra 3K grow legs and walk off just because they wanted bids of 5K

blue_max_3

Jumblebumble said:

Indeed but in my scenario the OP has then  not "overpaid"  by £5K as asserted  but by £500
I would not follow the herd and would bid £3K as this would probably crack the deal if no one else bid the 5K and I would save 2K
As stated I suspect the vendor is unlikely to watch an extra 3K grow legs and walk off just because they wanted bids of 5K

It sounds like the agent is not even going to acknowledge lesser bids, so unless someone stumps up the full 5k, they may not get the chance. It may push someone up from 3k to 5k. Maybe 2k to 5k, but unlikely 1k to 5k. It's an interesting concept. It certainly shows some confidence on behalf of the seller.