Private property purchase - swimming pool/value?!

retepetsir

They do have Power of Attourney as, awfully, both parents have dementia. 

The son is who contacted us originally and mainly did the work around the house due to being local. The other siblings were not as interested in helping out but I believe they all agree on the fact it needs to be sold. They also didn't seem overly keen on doing more work to the house in order to sell, and would rather sell 'as is' to let someone modernise as they saw fit. 

We do have young children so I had already priced up fitting fencing (or covering it in decking for the majority of the time) and using a pool alarm - it seems a shame to fill it in but I would also want to make it safe. I'm happy with the level of maintenance and that website is really useful, thank you. 

We had a brief discussion regarding value but I obviously didn't offer anything there and then. They'd mentioned possibly '600' but that seemed very high compared to the sales in 2018/19. We asked if they wouldn't mind getting it valued, to which they agreed it was a good idea to see where everyone stood. 

Our main issue is that our ceiling is around £550,000 so I was hoping we could manage that sort of figure. Similar sized properties in terms of square footage round here are coming in between 450-525k but the market has definitely picked up. I'm hoping for an update on a valuation by the end of this week and wondered if they'd go for the lower end for an easier sale but I guess maybe not?

I feel we may have to move on from this one which will be tough. The other option is we hold out for 6 months and see if they would sell privately in 2021 when we should be in a more flexible position.  

Sistergold

I suspect for the majority of people in the English weather a pool will be a negative? For me I would not talk of increase in price because of a pool infact I would be talking of a possible price reduction due to the effort of maintaining it! For high end house yes a pool makes sense but for the average house owner a pool is not what you will be looking for? I have seen some average houses taking so long to sell as they had the unexpected pool taking up valuable garden space. 

GDB2222

retepetsir said:

They do have Power of Attourney as, awfully, both parents have dementia. 

The son is who contacted us originally and mainly did the work around the house due to being local. The other siblings were not as interested in helping out but I believe they all agree on the fact it needs to be sold. They also didn't seem overly keen on doing more work to the house in order to sell, and would rather sell 'as is' to let someone modernise as they saw fit. 

We do have young children so I had already priced up fitting fencing (or covering it in decking for the majority of the time) and using a pool alarm - it seems a shame to fill it in but I would also want to make it safe. I'm happy with the level of maintenance and that website is really useful, thank you. 

We had a brief discussion regarding value but I obviously didn't offer anything there and then. They'd mentioned possibly '600' but that seemed very high compared to the sales in 2018/19. We asked if they wouldn't mind getting it valued, to which they agreed it was a good idea to see where everyone stood. 

Our main issue is that our ceiling is around £550,000 so I was hoping we could manage that sort of figure. Similar sized properties in terms of square footage round here are coming in between 450-525k but the market has definitely picked up. I'm hoping for an update on a valuation by the end of this week and wondered if they'd go for the lower end for an easier sale but I guess maybe not?

I feel we may have to move on from this one which will be tough. The other option is we hold out for 6 months and see if they would sell privately in 2021 when we should be in a more flexible position.  

I am a bit pessimistic about this. My experience with probate sales is that the family often want the earth. You'd think they'd want to get rid of an empty property ASAP, and that can be the case, but more often they have somewhat inflated ideas of value and no real need to sell in a hurry. This isn't a probate sale, but it's similar in nature.

The family will probably ask a few estate agents, who'll value high to get the business, and the family will want the highest of those figures.  

badger09

@retepetsir
We've lived in a house with an outdoor pool,  24' x 12' , for over 20 years. It was here when we moved in & I didn't like it. Its in a decent sized patio at side of house, so doesn't take space from the garden at the rear. It was originally heated by solar panels on the roof, but was so badly bodged we removed them after a couple of years. It also has a back up electric heater, which after the first year, we haven't used.

In those 20+ years we've bought/spent:
Pump x 2 @ £400 approx
Sand filter x 1 £400 approx
Summer solar cover x 2 £100
Winter cover x 2 £75 (last bought this year)
Chemicals, test kits etc £75 approx per year
Total £3050, so approx £150 per year.
It hasn't been the money pit I anticipated and its given us, and grandchildren, so much pleasure.  

We've very recently sold our house to a family with 2 teenagers, one of whom is a keen swimmer and couldn't be more pleased.

Feel free to PM if you want any more info 

Hannimal

I think your options here are slim, odds are they are not super motivated to sell asap. You could just say this to them and see what they make of it - they might agree on a sale for £550k

Our main issue is that our ceiling is around £550,000 so I was hoping we could manage that sort of figure. Similar sized properties in terms of square footage round here are coming in between 450-525k but the market has definitely picked up. I'm hoping for an update on a valuation by the end of this week and wondered if they'd go for the lower end for an easier sale but I guess maybe not?

retepetsir

Just to update everyone, and thank you for all the advice. Badger09 that's really useful too thank you, I might well PM you!

They came back with a very honest price (and even told us the range) on the hope that they could get something roughly in the middle. We can manage that so made an offer, and after consultation between all the siblings they have accepted! They are also happy to move quickly if needed. So we were extremely happy when we heard the news at the weekend. 

However, to throw a spanner in the works our buyers have literally just pulled out today, citing that they found a more suitable house to offer on. Even though we have a place with no chain to move to? They were the ones pushing us to find a property last week and get a move on?!

So frustrating!

UnderOffer

Oh thanks for the update, was thrilled to read they’d accepted your offer. What a pain re your buyers, just get your house back on market pronto and fingers crossed you’ll have another offer soon. 

badger09

retepetsir said:

Just to update everyone, and thank you for all the advice. Badger09 that's really useful too thank you, I might well PM you!

They came back with a very honest price (and even told us the range) on the hope that they could get something roughly in the middle. We can manage that so made an offer, and after consultation between all the siblings they have accepted! They are also happy to move quickly if needed. So we were extremely happy when we heard the news at the weekend. 

However, to throw a spanner in the works our buyers have literally just pulled out today, citing that they found a more suitable house to offer on. Even though we have a place with no chain to move to? They were the ones pushing us to find a property last week and get a move on?!

So frustrating!

Happy to provide any further info I can.

What a pain to have your buyers pull out now that you've found somewhere. However, if your house sold to 1st people to view it, hopefully you'll find another procedable buyer very quickly. 

retepetsir

Thanks very much everyone. I hope so too, just a pain to have viewings again. We'd cancelled all other booked viewing appointments previously at the request of our buyers so maybe that was a poor decision!

GDB2222

retepetsir said:

Thanks very much everyone. I hope so too, just a pain to have viewings again. We'd cancelled all other booked viewing appointments previously at the request of our buyers so maybe that was a poor decision!

Apparently, they thought you should stop showing, but they shouldn't stop looking. 

I understand that buyers don't want to invest time and money in a purchase without any commitment from sellers, but I'd have thought that could be covered by a simple agreement to pay a certain amount towards the other party's costs if you decide to back out of the sale.