First time buyer advice.. What offer to make

Alext1878

Hi all

After a long time of having bad credit and ccj's etc. I'm finally free of all that and ready to buy my first house. Had a couple of AIP's so know what kind of budget I'm working to.

There are two houses that I really like the look of but both have different challenges. 

House 1
Within our budget and is lovely, I'm really not sure why it is the price that it is. Spoke to the estate agent to get a viewing but was told the vendor hasn't found a house so isn't taking viewings right now. The house was first listed in May so quite a while. Is there anything I can try with the estate agent to try and get a viewing / see if we can make an offer?

House 2
Out of our budget. Been on the market since March which seems like a long time as again it is a nice house. I know the street it is on and know it is fairly busy (not a main road but connects two main roads and has a fairly big high school on it). What would be the lowest in terms of percentage would you be looking on a property that has been on the market for that long? I think if we could get it for 15% below the price then it would be within our budget.

We're first time buyers so no chain if that helps things. 

Thanks in advance and apologise if this has been asked before (I'm sure there are similar posts) 

MorningcoffeeIV

Alext1878 said:

What would be the lowest in terms of percentage would you be looking on a property that has been on the market for that long? 

It doesn't work like that.

How does the price compare to similar properties? Have others offered on it? What is it worth to you?

The buyer may be willing to accept under asking price,vor they may need to full price to be able to move.  They may even be expecting more than the asking price.

lookstraightahead

The first house I would leave well alone. As a cynical 50-something who has bought and sold for years, some sellers  I find like the 'dream' of selling but are too scared / can't be bothered / happy to keep you waiting ad infinitim.

there's no harm you looking at the other one and just offer what you can afford if you find you like it. Be prepared to walk if they don't want to accept. However, the housing market is all over the place and some sellers still have their heads in the clouds, while some have come down to reality a bit.

I think havjng nothing to sell is a huge advantage. I've always sold in advance of looking at a property purely for this reason, and it's made me an attractive buyer and I've always got a reduction of at least 10% on asking price. But many on here disagree with my experiences (or at least their experiences have been different).

the bottom line is don't offer more than you're comfortable with. And bear in mind that however much your seller tries to negotiate, the lender will value the property anyway.

EssexHebridean

The first one rings alarm bells for me too - usually the way things work is that you get an offer on your own property before you offer on somewhere you want to buy - it does sometimes happen the other way round, and sometimes that even works out well, but mostly, it’s pretty solid that it’s “agree sale, then find purchase”. It red-flags for me that the seller there doesn’t just take theirs off the market until they are ready to take viewings, I can’t see any benefit in leaving it there drifting down the listing order. 

On the second one, your best strategy might be an honest “this is what we can afford” approach, leaving just a fraction of slack in your budget for a “meet part way” second offer if needed. The house we have just bought was listed at 385k - above our budget. We offered 370k which we knew might be optimistic - the sellers came back and asked if we would meet in the middle and we did some sums and agreed. Our situation was different in that we weren’t FTBs - and in fact it was getting a little extra to our bottom-line figure on our sale which enabled as much slack in the budget as we had. 

If you love the property, then you have precisely nothing to lose by putting the offer in and seeing what happens. 

Good luck! 

Jonboy_1984

We viewed a house like the first and it then turned out my partner worked with the owners cousin .
 It turned out the owners adult children were pressuring them to sell up and closer so they could help with childcare and in turn be helped with jobs around the house as needed.
The owners had no real intention of moving and were playing a game to get their children off their backs... And are still there 2 years later... 

Alext1878

Thanks for the advice everyone. 

In response to morningcoffee, I was more asking what percentage lower than the asking price would be considered insulting really. Appreciate there are a number of factors but if it has been on the market for a while then maybe a lower offer has more chance. As I say, first time buyer and whilst I'm doing as much reading as I can, it's always good to hear other people's advice who might have more experience.

*I'm on nights at the moment hence the late night posts! 

YoungBlueEyes

When we were house-hunting, I was mentally 'revaluing' the houses I was looking at on RM. Checking what else was for sale, and nearby sold prices etc. I never did a % off though, it was round numbers and I was knocking larger round numbers off the asking price the longer the property had been on the market. 

E.G. house on the market 4 months, asking £250k, I was starting at £220k and would go up to £225k. Like that.