Quite the start

fewcloudy

Greymug said:

Update after almost 1 week since my property went on the market:

• 16 viewings done
• 13 viewings booked (3 of which are second viewings)
• 5 notes of interest
• 3 offers on the table, the highest being 12k above home report valuation

I'm waiting for at least 2 other good offers from viewers who seem to know the game and are keen to not go to a closing date with last and final offers.

@Greymug It would be good to hear how your sale finished?

Friends of mine missed out on this house recently which went to a closing date; 
https://espc.com/property/48-silverknowes-drive-edinburgh-eh4-5hh/35928330
They are cash buyers, no chain, and offered 20% over (so 84k above, plus a few lucky numbers)
Solicitor told them they were 6th best out of 12 offers...
Too soon to find out what it actually went for but will be interesting. Bearing in mind the LBTT will be nearly another 30k on top.

Greymug

I'll be able to give an update very shortly.

A closing date has been set up for my property.

All in all I've had 31 viewings (also including 2nd viewings). I did them myself, it was a tiring experience and sometimes frustrating as I had 1 no show and 2 last minute cancellations. But at the end of the day it was worth it, in fact I received some very positive feedback from the viewers.

Greymug

Hi @fewcloudy here's the update about my Edinburgh flat:

- my property stayed 2 weeks on the market
- I did 31 viewings (including some 2nd viewings)
- I received 3 offers after the 1st weekend, but rejected them as it was too early
- Overall my property had 6 notes of interest
- We went on a closing date last week
- I received 6 offers, the highest of which was 13% above home report valuation, from a chain free buyer.
- The weirdest offer was a fairly high one (although not the highest) from a cash buyer from abroad who never even viewed the property

All in all I'm very happy and the offers were way above my expectations. Now the next phase starts: the wait for mortgage application and related stuff.

AnotherJoe

Greymug said:

Question to all the people living in England: do you find it hard to understand how the Scottish housing market (offers over/home report valuation/closing date) works?

For example, things like paying above home report valuation is quite common or people making an aggressive offer way above valuation to avoid having to go to closing date...are these concepts hard to understand?

Just asking because I have an English friend, living in England, to whom I must have explained 4-5 times the differences between English and Scottish market and he just fails to understand and looks so surprised that someone has already offered over the home report valuation.

How long did it take you guys to understand the differences? Or is it him just not being the sharpest tool in the box?

Its just that the whole concept doesn't exist in England so i can see its hard getting your head round. I know the Scottish system is often praised (including by the English)  for being better than the English one with far fewer offers falling through and no gazumping but AIUI theres often little guidance on how much above home report valuation you "should" pay.

Indeed, if the home valuation is so accurate why do people pay above it?

For example, let says house is valued at £200k, sold for £220k then goes back on sale next week, what would the new home valuation say, would it now be £220k, or back to the £200k?

And if all houses are being sold at say 10% above home valuation price, why isnt the home valuation price raised so they balance out? Or does that happen?

Greymug

AnotherJoe said:

Its just that the whole concept doesn't exist in England so i can see its hard getting your head round. I know the Scottish system is often praised (including by the English)  for being better than the English one with far fewer offers falling through and no gazumping but AIUI theres often little guidance on how much above home report valuation you "should" pay.

Indeed, if the home valuation is so accurate why do people pay above it?

For example, let says house is valued at £200k, sold for £220k then goes back on sale next week, what would the new home valuation say, would it now be £220k, or back to the £200k?

And if all houses are being sold at say 10% above home valuation price, why isnt the home valuation price raised so they balance out? Or does that happen?

People pay above valuation for properties that are appealing and are likely to increase their value over the years. I'm ok paying 10k over valuation if, judging by the market trends, I'm confident I will be able to sell the same property in 1 year and make a profit of 10k+X

Also, even if the home report is accurate, people pay above it because they want the property. Otherwise, if everyone offered the same amount (home report valuation) how would you choose whose offer to accept? If you want something, you pay what it's worth to you.

For Scotland, this trend seems to be going on for years. It's also useful to say that not all properties sell for above valaution: if you have a crap property in a non desirable area, you're not going to make much money.

From speaking with this friend of mine, the main issue seems to be that there's a lot of confusion around the concept of "valuation" and "asking price". They're not the same thing but my friend struggled to understand that difference. 

Mr_owl

I find this quite interesting that flats are that desirable up in the Scotland. In England it seems quite the opposite. Flats seems to be pretty difficult to sell in comparison to the freehold houses. When a house sells in England it is often best and final offer and flats can stay on the market, some very decent ones for weeks if not months. They will barely reach the asking price and often are being sold for 5-10% less if not cheaper. Is it the start of new trend that flats becoming more desirable? Maybe it's the return of 5% deposits and banks being more lenient towards ftb's.

fewcloudy

Mr_owl said:

I find this quite interesting that flats are that desirable up in the Scotland. In England it seems quite the opposite. Flats seems to be pretty difficult to sell in comparison to the freehold houses. When a house sells in England it is often best and final offer and flats can stay on the market, some very decent ones for weeks if not months. They will barely reach the asking price and often are being sold for 5-10% less if not cheaper. Is it the start of new trend that flats becoming more desirable? Maybe it's the return of 5% deposits and banks being more lenient towards ftb's.

@Mr_owl
 Well for starters we don't have freehold/leasehold in Scotland. If you buy a property you own it. Flats, houses, it doesn't matter, we just have ownership of it.
In terms of the flats where you live, I have no idea why they do not sell.
Here in Edinburgh and Glasgow (and almost everywhere else in Scotland!) they are the most likely property for FTBs. But futher up the ladder they can sell for very high prices indeed depending on the location they are in of course.

There are 'flats' like this one that are very far removed from being for FTBs!...(but seems to mostly have views of brick walls!)
https://espc.com/property/s09-the-playfair-at-donaldsons-edinburgh-eh12-5fa/35910638?sid=545606

A bit more typical here...
https://espc.com/property/53f2-randolph-place-west-end-eh3-7tq/36001764?sid=254083

And much more typical FTB flat here...
https://espc.com/property/30-10-watson-crescent-polwarth-edinburgh-eh11-1hf/35928748?sid=159667

AnotherJoe

Greymug said:

AnotherJoe said:

Its just that the whole concept doesn't exist in England so i can see its hard getting your head round. I know the Scottish system is often praised (including by the English)  for being better than the English one with far fewer offers falling through and no gazumping but AIUI theres often little guidance on how much above home report valuation you "should" pay.

Indeed, if the home valuation is so accurate why do people pay above it?

For example, let says house is valued at £200k, sold for £220k then goes back on sale next week, what would the new home valuation say, would it now be £220k, or back to the £200k?

And if all houses are being sold at say 10% above home valuation price, why isnt the home valuation price raised so they balance out? Or does that happen?

People pay above valuation for properties that are appealing and are likely to increase their value over the years. I'm ok paying 10k over valuation if, judging by the market trends, I'm confident I will be able to sell the same property in 1 year and make a profit of 10k+X

Also, even if the home report is accurate, people pay above it because they want the property. Otherwise, if everyone offered the same amount (home report valuation) how would you choose whose offer to accept? If you want something, you pay what it's worth to you.

For Scotland, this trend seems to be going on for years. It's also useful to say that not all properties sell for above valaution: if you have a crap property in a non desirable area, you're not going to make much money.

From speaking with this friend of mine, the main issue seems to be that there's a lot of confusion around the concept of "valuation" and "asking price". They're not the same thing but my friend struggled to understand that difference. 

From how you've described it there does t's eem to be much difference plus there's certainly soem confusion for example if peopel will pay above the home valuation price because it's especially desirable and likely o appreciate in price why isn't that already factored into the home valuation price?
and if it's a crummy place in a bad area and people  offer under the valuation (I presume that happens) then is that any difference to England? It's just that a different person has arbitrarily valued it. 
so I think I agree with your friend it's just another way of saying "asking price" with TBF one key difference it's agreed what a mortgage company will value it at whereas that can go wrong with the English system. .  So that's definitely better. 
The other big difference is also in the way the legalities work (better IMO)

Greymug

AnotherJoe said:

Greymug said:

AnotherJoe said:

Its just that the whole concept doesn't exist in England so i can see its hard getting your head round. I know the Scottish system is often praised (including by the English)  for being better than the English one with far fewer offers falling through and no gazumping but AIUI theres often little guidance on how much above home report valuation you "should" pay.

Indeed, if the home valuation is so accurate why do people pay above it?

For example, let says house is valued at £200k, sold for £220k then goes back on sale next week, what would the new home valuation say, would it now be £220k, or back to the £200k?

And if all houses are being sold at say 10% above home valuation price, why isnt the home valuation price raised so they balance out? Or does that happen?

People pay above valuation for properties that are appealing and are likely to increase their value over the years. I'm ok paying 10k over valuation if, judging by the market trends, I'm confident I will be able to sell the same property in 1 year and make a profit of 10k+X

Also, even if the home report is accurate, people pay above it because they want the property. Otherwise, if everyone offered the same amount (home report valuation) how would you choose whose offer to accept? If you want something, you pay what it's worth to you.

For Scotland, this trend seems to be going on for years. It's also useful to say that not all properties sell for above valaution: if you have a crap property in a non desirable area, you're not going to make much money.

From speaking with this friend of mine, the main issue seems to be that there's a lot of confusion around the concept of "valuation" and "asking price". They're not the same thing but my friend struggled to understand that difference. 

From how you've described it there does t's eem to be much difference plus there's certainly soem confusion for example if peopel will pay above the home valuation price because it's especially desirable and likely o appreciate in price why isn't that already factored into the home valuation price?
and if it's a crummy place in a bad area and people  offer under the valuation (I presume that happens) then is that any difference to England? It's just that a different person has arbitrarily valued it. 
so I think I agree with your friend it's just another way of saying "asking price" with TBF one key difference it's agreed what a mortgage company will value it at whereas that can go wrong with the English system. .  So that's definitely better. 
The other big difference is also in the way the legalities work (better IMO)

There absolutely IS difference between home report valuation and asking price.

Home report valuation is the answer to the question "how much is my property worth?"

Asking price is the answer to the question "how much do I want to sell it for?" and knowing the Scottish market, it's more than the home report valuation.

So, seems like the confusion is only for people who are not familiar and don't quite understand the Scottish market.

Greymug

fewcloudy said:

Mr_owl said:

I find this quite interesting that flats are that desirable up in the Scotland. In England it seems quite the opposite. Flats seems to be pretty difficult to sell in comparison to the freehold houses. When a house sells in England it is often best and final offer and flats can stay on the market, some very decent ones for weeks if not months. They will barely reach the asking price and often are being sold for 5-10% less if not cheaper. Is it the start of new trend that flats becoming more desirable? Maybe it's the return of 5% deposits and banks being more lenient towards ftb's.

There are 'flats' like this one that are very far removed from being for FTBs!...(but seems to mostly have views of brick walls!)
https://espc.com/property/s09-the-playfair-at-donaldsons-edinburgh-eh12-5fa/35910638?sid=545606

Nice. Does it come with the girl in the photos? That's why it's so expensive I guess