First time buyer - 3rd house fallen through.

user1977

piglet2017 said:

It feels like the downvaluation issue is one across all types of properties, not just those in their price bracket?

Yes, but if they go for a lower price bracket they will have enough cash to make up the difference.

[Deleted User]

FedUpFirstTimeBuyer24 said:

I honestly cannot believe our bad luck in wanting to buy a house. I’m trying to stay positive as we are lucky to be in the situation to be able to buy and we are happy with our rental property, but we’ve lost a lot of money now and have been through this process for over 18 months. 

I am a school teacher but I also own a tutoring agency which I currently run as self employed sole trader. We have been waiting for the last 18 months to change to a limited company as we didn’t want to change legal entity whilst wanting to buy a house. However, now we have had all this bad luck, I’m wondering if I should just change legal entity now, save a lot more money in doing so and then look to buy a house in the future when the market is hopefully a bit more stable?! 

It just feels like something is telling us now isn’t the right time to buy. Surely if 3 houses have fallen through this is telling?
The market is insane where we are at the moment. We are in Berkshire and we are looking at 475k for a 3 bed! 

Any advice would be amazing. I feel totally lost and overwhelmed. 

Thank you! 

Some context: 
1st house - March 2021. Shocking survey. Vendors only willing to knock £500 off for thousands and thousands of pounds of work. Forced to pull out. 

2nd house- January 2022- down valuation of 30k. Forced to pull out as our deposit was already at maximum and again, no flexibility.

3rd House - March 2022. Down valuation of 50k. Structural survey finding timber that had potentially rotted and a strange construction. Forced to pull out as again no negotiation for thousands and thousands of pounds of work. 

Welcome to Britain.

Most houses will have at least one expensive issue on the survey, many will have more. Houses here were often poorly built to start with, and many are now well beyond the point where they should have been replaced.

Down valuations are the norm now, housing is massively over-priced and banks don't want to risk losing large sums of money if the market corrects.

Basically as a FTB who needs a mortgage, you are screwed. Consider emigrating or waiting 10-15 years for things to improve. I'm not joking, this isn't going to get better any time soon and there are no solutions. Ireland is nice and no language barrier or visa needed.

GDB2222

user1977 said:

piglet2017 said:

It feels like the downvaluation issue is one across all types of properties, not just those in their price bracket?

Yes, but if they go for a lower price bracket they will have enough cash to make up the difference.

That doesn’t really help very much, though. 

If they have say £47.5k deposit, that’s 10% of a £475k house. Which leaves nothing over if there’s a problem.

If instead they want to put 10% down on a £400k house, that only leaves them £7.5k leeway, whereas the op has had down valuation or repair bills of £30k+.

user1977

GDB2222 said:

user1977 said:

piglet2017 said:

It feels like the downvaluation issue is one across all types of properties, not just those in their price bracket?

Yes, but if they go for a lower price bracket they will have enough cash to make up the difference.

That doesn’t really help very much, though. 

If they have say £47.5k deposit, that’s 10% of a £475k house. Which leaves nothing over if there’s a problem.

If instead they want to put 10% down on a £400k house, that only leaves them £7.5k leeway, whereas the op has had down valuation or repair bills of £30k+.

True, though the downvaluation / repair costs are likely to be lower for a cheaper property too.

But they may well need to drop down a further price bracket than that anyway.

aoleks

one bad survey is possible... two bad surveys... maybe... three bad surveys? I don't think so. if you ask me, there's one issue:

you never bought a house and you're literally thinking everything mentioned on the survey MUST be repaired and it will cost the amount quoted. if you continue like this, you will never own a house because no house is perfect and on paper, they all need a lot of work (which has been probably calculated in the price).

take an experienced buyer/house owner with you, otherwise you'll fail every survey for no good reason.

I've seen surveys with £20k worth of work, but all the work was cosmetic or suspected. don't expect the seller to accommodate that.

HRH_MUngo

My friends bought a house forty years ago.  They were granted a mortgage, but were told on the survey  that they would need a whole new roof within a year.  They never did get it done, just had a few tiles replaced.  Roof still doing its job well forty years later.

I agree with others, don't take everything it says on a survey to heart.

YoungBlueEyes

Can we stop saying “down valuation” please?  What you really mean is - the people footing the bill disagree with the figure I decided to offer ! 

Dusk1983

GDB2222 said:

If you don’t have a large deposit, you’ll have to be careful not to over-offer, but of course that may mean you don’t get to buy anything. However, at least you won’t be wasting money on fees for purchases that are liable to fall through.

This forum is heavily biased to older property owners with equity, and most days we have one of you popping up with this kind of “advice”.

If you strip away all the faux helpfulness, all you lot effectively say to FTBs is “know your place” as you pull that ladder up behind you. Well, no. Screw that.

OP, don’t listen to people like this. Do whatever you need to secure a property, including offering up to your absolute maximum then reducing later if needed. It’s brutal out there and if you listen to people like the guy above, you’ll be renting forever.

simon_or

YoungBlueEyes said:

Can we stop saying “down valuation” please?  What you really mean is - the people footing the bill disagree with the figure I decided to offer ! 

You and I can stop calling it a down-valuation, but the folk that matter (lenders, valuers, brokers, Estate Agents) use that term, rightly or wrongly, to describe the situation where the lender returns a lower valuation than that agreed between the buyer and the seller. I don't think that's going to change.

nicknameless

[Deleted User] said:

FedUpFirstTimeBuyer24 said:

I honestly cannot believe our bad luck in wanting to buy a house. I’m trying to stay positive as we are lucky to be in the situation to be able to buy and we are happy with our rental property, but we’ve lost a lot of money now and have been through this process for over 18 months. 

I am a school teacher but I also own a tutoring agency which I currently run as self employed sole trader. We have been waiting for the last 18 months to change to a limited company as we didn’t want to change legal entity whilst wanting to buy a house. However, now we have had all this bad luck, I’m wondering if I should just change legal entity now, save a lot more money in doing so and then look to buy a house in the future when the market is hopefully a bit more stable?! 

It just feels like something is telling us now isn’t the right time to buy. Surely if 3 houses have fallen through this is telling?
The market is insane where we are at the moment. We are in Berkshire and we are looking at 475k for a 3 bed! 

Any advice would be amazing. I feel totally lost and overwhelmed. 

Thank you! 

Some context: 
1st house - March 2021. Shocking survey. Vendors only willing to knock £500 off for thousands and thousands of pounds of work. Forced to pull out. 

2nd house- January 2022- down valuation of 30k. Forced to pull out as our deposit was already at maximum and again, no flexibility.

3rd House - March 2022. Down valuation of 50k. Structural survey finding timber that had potentially rotted and a strange construction. Forced to pull out as again no negotiation for thousands and thousands of pounds of work. 

Welcome to Britain.

Most houses will have at least one expensive issue on the survey, many will have more. Houses here were often poorly built to start with, and many are now well beyond the point where they should have been replaced.

Down valuations are the norm now, housing is massively over-priced and banks don't want to risk losing large sums of money if the market corrects.

Basically as a FTB who needs a mortgage, you are screwed. Consider emigrating or waiting 10-15 years for things to improve. I'm not joking, this isn't going to get better any time soon and there are no solutions. Ireland is nice and no language barrier or visa needed.

Don't be too offended if I don't invite you to a motivational speaking event will you lol.