Offer without viewing not passed on

Spiderroo

MysteryMe said:

This is likely to be the biggest financial commitment of your life. Would you ring up a second hand car dealer and buy a car unseen?   I know you are not committed to buying the house but if your terms had been accepted and you didn't go through with it you have basically burned your bridges with that particular EA. As frustrating as it is you must try not get caught up in the heat of the moment.  As well as potentially looking at other areas try and build up a relationship with the EA so you are high on their list of people to contact if a suitable property is coming onto the market.  Try and do it in person, it's difficult just over the phone. You could also consider leafleting if you have quite a narrow search area.  There will be other houses, don't despair. 

We have been going into the agents in person as much as possible to try and build the required connections. The areas covered by agents are quite small whereas our potential areas are pretty wide (with certain smaller patches ticking all the boxes) so we can’t visit every office personally but we, as a minimum, offer in person as we think if they’ve got one house we like that much, they may well have another one soon. 

We saw the house today and it was even better than we expected so our offer is still on the table. We’ve seen a lot of properties now and this one is, for us, the perfect location and layout for what we need. 

Spiderroo

Noneforit999 said:

Agree with the consensus here. As a vendor myself currently, I wouldn't accept an offer without the buyer viewing it first.

What were you hoping to achieve in making an offer before viewing? That they would take it off the market and cancel any other planned viewings? Do me a favour. 

I’ve got a friend who sold his house recently to a buyer who offered without viewing (buyer based in another city) and another friend who offered on a flat without viewing and had their offer accepted (lived there for 3+ years now). It’s clearly worked for them and it’s so competitive it seems worth trying anything possible. 

peterhjohnson

Spiderroo said:

Yep, we are absolutely trying to get it off the market because we know it’s where we want to be. For our life and our future that location sits perfectly for a variety of reasons so if we find the decor inside isn’t right or things need fixing we’ll just get on with it. If we weren’t 100% sure we’d take it whatever we wouldn’t offer without viewing - we’ve never done it before and we’ve spent a lot of time considering if we’re happy to take the risk.

Sure. We can all see the advantages to you of the seller going along with that. Now, try thinking about it from the seller's point of view

Spiderroo

As an update we viewed today and our offer still stands. We’ve had confirmation our offer has been submitted to the buyer too. The house is even better than we expected from the photos and video, it’s the first one that ticks every single box without compromises. 

We don’t know what comes next as the agent doing the viewings said it would go to best and final but the office manager said the vendor may accept an offer. There seemed to be conflicting answers for quite a few things so I’m not sure they’re communicating very well between themselves. 

lisyloo

Or they are trying to get you to up your offer.
they work for the seller (and their own commission), they don’t work for you.
It’s best to remember who’s interests they are acting in.

propertyhunter

The issue with offering really early is that it puts you at a disadvantage. Firstly, an EA may tell other buyers we've had an offer from someone even before viewing - this changes the mindset of the competition to be more aggressive in their offers - and secondly, you don't get a sense of the competition when you submit your offer. Waiting until the hour before the deadline means you can ask the estate agent questions about the level of interest from other buyers, and you can respond accordingly. 

Thrugelmir

Spiderroo said:

jenni_fer said:

From the seller perspective I get it, and I'd also be thinking that if someone is that keen, just imagine how much demand there might be if I allow a decent amount of viewings.

As a buyer, we've lost out at best and final a number of times and also had a fallen through purchase so I really sympathise with you. We've only considered offering without viewing once and that was a property identical to one we'd just lost out on and with the same EA so they could have a reasonable level of comfort we knew what we were doing (vendor then decided they weren't selling after all).

Do the viewing, make a considered offer and hope for the best. Will cross my fingers this is the one for you!

Did you find a house in the end? It’s reaching the point now where I can’t see us ever being successful. 

We’re not cash buyers or developers and we worry offering £50k over asking will just lead to the mortgage company massively undervaluing the property. 

You need to distinguish between overpaying and an under valuation. As what you are conveniently overlooking is that it's the mortgage company's money that's at risk not yours. The property has to provide adequate security for the money advanced. That's why borrowing on a mortgage is at such a low rate of interest. Offers are just words that ultimately have to be supported by substance. With the head overruling the heart. 

Spiderroo

Thrugelmir said:

Spiderroo said:

jenni_fer said:

From the seller perspective I get it, and I'd also be thinking that if someone is that keen, just imagine how much demand there might be if I allow a decent amount of viewings.

As a buyer, we've lost out at best and final a number of times and also had a fallen through purchase so I really sympathise with you. We've only considered offering without viewing once and that was a property identical to one we'd just lost out on and with the same EA so they could have a reasonable level of comfort we knew what we were doing (vendor then decided they weren't selling after all).

Do the viewing, make a considered offer and hope for the best. Will cross my fingers this is the one for you!

Did you find a house in the end? It’s reaching the point now where I can’t see us ever being successful. 

We’re not cash buyers or developers and we worry offering £50k over asking will just lead to the mortgage company massively undervaluing the property. 

You need to distinguish between overpaying and an under valuation. As what you are conveniently overlooking is that it's the mortgage company's money that's at risk not yours. The property has to provide adequate security for the money advanced. That's why borrowing on a mortgage is at such a low rate of interest. Offers are just words that ultimately have to be supported by substance. With the head overruling the heart. 

I wasn’t criticising the banks for not lending crazy money on properties, I understand why they don’t. We don’t want to end up in a situation where we offer XXX to be successful at the best and final stage then find it’s valued at 10,000s less. So we look at local house prices, etc and offer at most up a little bit over the top end of forecast values for a property of that size in that area. That seems to me like the sensible approach? It seems better than offering to win whatever the cost anyway.

RoyalDad

Just a few hours ago I turned down a £25k over asking price offer as the buyer lived in Hong Kong and hadn't seen the house. Apparently he was buying for his family to live in. The estate agent agreed with me that it was very strange and was way too risky. I would just be waiting for them to come and see the house and they decide it wasn't for them etc.