Should I view houses above my budget, in the hopes of negotiating?

theonenonly

My budget is maxed around £400,000 with how much my lender will lend me plus deposit. It's the same homes in the area I'm looking for in that price, however when increasing the filter to 425, a whole lot more nicer properties pop up.

I know negotiation is down to a whole lot of factors. But wondering if I'd be wasting my time using this approach?

Hoenir

There's always nicer properties in the price bracket above. That's why there more expensive. 

eddddy

If you see a property you like, phone the estate agent and say your absolute max budget is £400k, so is it worth viewing or would you be wasting everyone's time.

(But tbh, often the estate agent will encourage you to view anyway - even if they think it's doubtful that an offer of £400k would be accepted.)

DullGreyGuy

theonenonly said:

My budget is maxed around £400,000 with how much my lender will lend me plus deposit. It's the same homes in the area I'm looking for in that price, however when increasing the filter to 425, a whole lot more nicer properties pop up.

I know negotiation is down to a whole lot of factors. But wondering if I'd be wasting my time using this approach?

The fact it's "around" means it could be more than £400k so it's not really getting a £425k down to £400 but meeting somewhere in the middle. 

Our last landlord advertised our place for sale at £650k, they asked if we were interested and we said we thought it was worth less than £600k. They dropped it to £625k, then offered to us for £600k but we'd had an offer accepted elsewhere and said it'd have to be less than our offer. They then dropped it to £600k. I stopped watching after that but do know that about year after we moved out they sold it for £525k.

Sale prices can be significantly under the advertised price but it can take a while for the seller to accept that. I'd certainly be looking at £425k, maybe even £450k as a £426k property really isn't a material difference from £425k

powerful_Rogue

theonenonly said:

My budget is maxed around £400,000 with how much my lender will lend me plus deposit. It's the same homes in the area I'm looking for in that price, however when increasing the filter to 425, a whole lot more nicer properties pop up.

I know negotiation is down to a whole lot of factors. But wondering if I'd be wasting my time using this approach?

More the sellers time you're wasting.

BarelySentientAI

theonenonly said:

My budget is maxed around £400,000 with how much my lender will lend me plus deposit. It's the same homes in the area I'm looking for in that price, however when increasing the filter to 425, a whole lot more nicer properties pop up.

I know negotiation is down to a whole lot of factors. But wondering if I'd be wasting my time using this approach?

You will waste some time, because some sellers won't move as far as you want on price.

Others would, and you would miss out on those chances if you didn't look.

Problem is you don't know which are which until you try.

Jemma01

I def would try after declaring that my max is 400k. The agent knows how much the seller is willing to accept; if they think your offer won't be accepted they'll show you something else. 

I saw a house at 425k, price dropped to 415k, stayed in the market for few months and then withdrawn. Maybe if they got 400k they would have accepted instead of waiting and dropping out 🤔

Albermarle

however when increasing the filter to 425, a whole lot more nicer properties pop up.

That's life is it not?

Anyway a discount from asking price is normal ( although not guaranteed), even for properties that are not greatly overpriced. In the second half of 2023 the average discount was 5.5%. 

£425K minus 5.5% = £401.6 K

Exodi

Definitely, especially in the current market (half the houses down my way have been on the market for 6-12 months, slowly being reduced). I'd look at £425k houses even if the market was different.

You may even be able to look at £450k houses, but depends on the buyer. Someone that listed their property on the market yesterday may be less willing to accept an offer ~9% under asking (just yet), whereas someone who's had their property up since Christmas may.

YoungBlueEyes

A trick I used to do was this - on rightmove app, check all the houses in your area/budget. Then flick the order around so it shows oldest listings first and up the budget. You're more likely to be able to knock lumps off the asking price of houses that have been on for months than those that went on last week.
The exception to this is the people who are waiting for a particular sort of buyer to fall in love with their 'unique' house and will pay the full whack. They're waiting because they've already mentally spent that money on the house/area they want to move to. You can do nothing with those people but they're few and far between I think.

FlorayG

Absolutely yes, I've both bought AND sold at substantial discount, the first because I was buying properties that had been on the market a long time and struggling to get sold ( both empty - empty properties tend to be more flexible on offers) and the second because I wanted a quick sale and the buyer had cash, the EA had dealt with him before and said he was genuine and wouldn't mess me about
Ask your EA - the first one I bought was hugely above my budget and I didn't want to bother but the EA said they absolutely would consider a lower offer. A local EA knows