Help with the difficult situation we are in (seller has pulled out)

TranceNRG

Deleted_User,, thanks very much.

We will never know what her true intentions were and what happened.

Hope we'll find a nice house that ticks most of the boxes. 

letsbetfair

TranceNRG said:

I don't accept your 'she was railroaded' comment. We thought she was a friend and she had no one to help her. She had lost the flat she was planning on buying and her estate agents weren't helping her. She asked us to help her. We didn't force her to buy anything. She's the one that offered above tune asking price.
Our mistake was to trust her even though we were warned by our estate agents.

2K in not a lot in the grand scheme of things. But adding up other additional costs, it will be well over 6, 7K. And we won't be able to get stamp duty savings. So realistically we will lose 20-25k from our budget
We also don't know how long it will take to find another house. Plus we'll have the stress of moving twice. So not exactly an easy decision. 

What typically happens with stamp duty holidays is that prices go up because of them. It's likely that your house is worth more if sold during the stamp duty holiday, and if you buy now the price of potential purchases will also be slightly inflated due to this holiday. No guarantees, but that might mean selling during the holiday and buying a bit after isn't as bad a financial move as it intuitively seems.

Crashy_Time

If your budget is 800k the 2k fee won`t be a concern for you?

Pepod

Just because someone has a good salary doesn't mean 2 grand is nothing to be concerned about... This perception seems to be really common and until you start to earn mega money then if 2 grand is 6 months groceries to someone on 15k  it's still (roughly) 6 months groceries to someone on 150k. Not to mention that if 2k is coming out of deposit money then it's likely closer to 20k in value house-budget value.

To the OP - your situation sounds really messy. I don't think you should have got so involved/sucked in regardless of who asked for help or what the reasons were. I think you need to take a step back, take a breath and have a good think about what the best way to proceed will be for you and your girlfriend. Letters round doors might work, but I would caution against rushing to buy a property just to try and beat the stamp duty holiday, as saving ~20k right now may seem foolish in the future if you end up in a money pit that you find out you don't really like.

wannabe_a_saver

Wow you really overstepped your boundaries with that poor lady!  I hope you’ve learned that was not an acceptable way to behave! 

Repeatedly going banging on the door and calling after she’s clearly told you she’s decided not to sell was incredibly inappropriate bordering on intimidation! 

deannagone

I'm sorry but 2k is a lot more than 6 months shopping to someone on 15k a year.  You aren't really able to understand the position of people other than yourselves which is affecting your ability to assess risks that always exist when buying/selling houses.  I'm pointing this out to increase your chances of success.  I appreciate you are devastated that your purchase fell through but I'm not surprised.  Three days helping the other lady to find somewhere to live is not long (from her point of view) and then she discovered she couldn't sell at all.  You are making judgements when actually she sounds like someone in a bad position who needs to move (downsize), but can't, and fairly vulnerable.  She is probably feeling pretty awful right now too.., probably worse as she will know she can't deal with the situation, had let you down, obviously liked you as well, and can't move at all.  You at least can.

I think the leaflet dropping idea is a good one.  But remember the other person is starting from a position of not being prepared to move as quickly as you are right now.

Another option would be to wait for a year, let prices settle down once the stamp duty holiday no longer exists.  You may well get less money for your property, but you are likely to pay 'more less' for the onward move.., which should more than make up for the loss of stamp duty.  Others may disagree but not sure present artificially high property prices can be maintained once the stamp duty holiday no longer exists.  No guarantees, but its an option I'd be looking at in your situation.

UnderOffer

We received a leaflet through our door asking if we were thinking of selling - it was a polite short note, confirming they had sold and were looking for a home in our area with parking, no. Of bedrooms etc. Gave mobile number and email address. They successfully bought around the corner, so it can work. 

TranceNRG

Pepod said:

Just because someone has a good salary doesn't mean 2 grand is nothing to be concerned about... This perception seems to be really common and until you start to earn mega money then if 2 grand is 6 months groceries to someone on 15k  it's still (roughly) 6 months groceries to someone on 150k. Not to mention that if 2k is coming out of deposit money then it's likely closer to 20k in value house-budget value.

To the OP - your situation sounds really messy. I don't think you should have got so involved/sucked in regardless of who asked for help or what the reasons were. I think you need to take a step back, take a breath and have a good think about what the best way to proceed will be for you and your girlfriend. Letters round doors might work, but I would caution against rushing to buy a property just to try and beat the stamp duty holiday, as saving ~20k right now may seem foolish in the future if you end up in a money pit that you find out you don't really like.

Thank you. Our combined salary isn't anywhere near 150K. It's about 100K (Whilst it's a good figure, it's probably not big for families around here). The rest of the money comes from the our savings, sale of the flat and gifts from families. I get the feeling that some people are perhaps feeling a bit jealous hence not showing empathy. I probably sholdn't have revealed all the figures.

Yes in hindsight we shouldn't have got involved with the lady at all as there were warning signs from the begining but ignored them and decided to help.

You are absolutely right. We don't want to buy for the sake of it. We need to like the place and it needs to tick most of the boxes. If we sell the flat now and buy something later, we are probably going to lose close to 25K from our budget and we are already struggling to see find anything nice in this area.
Someone mentioned prices being inflated at the moment because of stampy duty savings. I am not sure how true this is in London. Prices here have stagnated or gone down in the last couple of years and only now starting to go up I think. They might go up further in the next few months and we'll be worse off. I guess no one knows which way things are going to go.

To the person saying poor woman and we intimidated her? You got to be joking! She abused our trust, kindness and friendship. If somoene you know let you down in a big way and couldn't explain that to you in person, would you go 'oh well' and forget about it like that? Or would you try to contact them? 

TranceNRG

UnderOffer said:

We received a leaflet through our door asking if we were thinking of selling - it was a polite short note, confirming they had sold and were looking for a home in our area with parking, no. Of bedrooms etc. Gave mobile number and email address. They successfully bought around the corner, so it can work. 

Thank you. We've never done anything like this and not sure how people will react to us dropping leaflets. Also not sure how many we need to print (probably 100s if we are going to drop them for houses in a few nearby streets). 

wannabe_a_saver

TranceNRG said:

Pepod said:

Just because someone has a good salary doesn't mean 2 grand is nothing to be concerned about... This perception seems to be really common and until you start to earn mega money then if 2 grand is 6 months groceries to someone on 15k  it's still (roughly) 6 months groceries to someone on 150k. Not to mention that if 2k is coming out of deposit money then it's likely closer to 20k in value house-budget value.

To the OP - your situation sounds really messy. I don't think you should have got so involved/sucked in regardless of who asked for help or what the reasons were. I think you need to take a step back, take a breath and have a good think about what the best way to proceed will be for you and your girlfriend. Letters round doors might work, but I would caution against rushing to buy a property just to try and beat the stamp duty holiday, as saving ~20k right now may seem foolish in the future if you end up in a money pit that you find out you don't really like.

Yes in hindsight we shouldn't have got involved with the lady at all as there were warning signs from the begining but ignored them and decided to help.

person, would you go 'oh well' and forget about it like that? Or would you try to contact them? 

Uh, no, she should never have got involved with you!  I can’t believe you honestly think you were right and she was wrong here!