Selling first home where to start?!

Aimez

Getting an appraisal next week and another week after. One agent has sold multiple properties for my parents abd family friends (they used to rent places before they divorced, but with no mortgage I only have limited advice from my parents.)
I can't do anything regarding thr mortgage without a value when I get to the moving house part on the website. Annoying I maybe wasting everyone's time potentially but no ither choice I suppose only way to work out finances really particularly as my house layout it very usual so quite hard to value. 

Bigphil1474

Unless you have a high end or unusual property, most EA's are pretty much of a muchness. They stick your particulars in their window, slap it on Rightmove, and organise viewings. They then do some checks on the buyer if you get an acceptable offer. We got 3 local ones to quote and the fees were pretty much the same. In the end we went with the agent we liked the most. We did avoid one EA outlet that was known to be difficult to get hold off - if you can't get hold of them, how can potential buyers.

paulintheprocess

I’d keep it really simple and just break it into a few steps.

First, ring your current lender and ask two things: can you port your mortgage if you move, and what are the early repayment charges if you do not. That will tell you if moving before September is realistic or if it is better to aim for after the fix ends.

Second, get two or three estate agents round for valuations and ask what they realistically think it will sell for, not the “best case”. From that, take off your mortgage balance and moving costs (fees, removals, stamp duty if it applies) and you will see what you have left to put into the next place.

Once you know those numbers, a broker can show you what you can borrow for the new house. It feels like a lot, but it is just a sequence of phone calls and appointments rather than one big scary jump.

Aimez

Hey everyone. I am back with an update but am confused about equity, saving to minus fees from. I feel quite stupid! So two agents valued the house at the same really. I would NOT go with one as they as very aggressive and don't listen to me sending me houses £25k over what I can afford and chasing me when I  was waiting for their finance woman to give me figures. 
So They valued the house, told me what my current bank can lend me (assume this means porting thr mortgage?!) told me the equity and savings figure. They did a mortgage in principle based on all these things and what I habe left to pay. I have a list of fees but can't seem to get me hear around how they get the equity figure? It didn't help they sent me mortgage in principle with no breakdown of all this to start and they took a long time to do all that.
I will also ask if they have to charge to lifetime broker costs at £700 as I have been doing this myself for 10 years ok!? I will also ask the other agent who family and friends all like to quote for this as this agent is very disjointed with their internal communications already. 
I am very aware of them bolting things on to take advantage of my naivety! I am trying to calculate this all as worst case scenario i.e I buy at for sale price, sell at low end price and have money to spare for things to buy when moving in. 

eddddy

Aimez said:

So They valued the house, told me what my current bank can lend me (assume this means porting thr mortgage?!) 

Maybe or maybe not. Is your current mortgage portable? Will you have the same LTV (loan to value) on the new property? Did the advisor say this is related to porting your mortgage?

Aimez said:

I have a list of fees but can't seem to get me hear around how they get the equity figure?

 You calculate equity (in your current property) like this...

• A ...How much will you sell your current property for?

• B... How much do you still owe on your current mortgage?

Your equity is A minus B 

(In simple terms, assume you pay off your current mortgage when you sell your current property.)

But at this stage, you can't be certain how much you will sell your current property for... you might have to accept a lower offer, and/or you might have to reduce the price to get offers. So you can't be 100% certain of how much equity you will have.





Then... the amount you can afford to pay for your next property is

• Your equity (as above) PLUS any savings you want to add PLUS whatever mortgage amount you borrow

(But there will be a bunch of costs to pay as well, like estate agent's fees, solicitor's fees, survey fees, SDLT, etc)

Aimez said:

I will also ask if they have to charge to lifetime broker costs at £700 as I have been doing this myself for 10 years ok!?

In simple terms, I suspect this is a fee for arranging a mortgage on the property you buy, arranging any future re-mortgages, and new mortgages for any future purchases.

It's up to you to decide if it's something you want.

If you don't expect to do any re-mortgages, or buy any future properties (with mortgages), it's probably not very useful to you.

Bigphil1474

I wouldn't go with the mortgage advisor and any solicitor recommended by an Estate agent unless I'd done my research and they are the best available. I've never used a broker, and paying £700 to use one seems excessive. Like you, we've always arranged the mortgage ourselves. Sounds like your gut is telling you they are trying to make you spend unnecessary money, and I think your gut is correct. 

horsewithnoname

A friend who bought a house fairly recently used a free broker (recommended on this site), who gave an amount that could be borrowed, but then when they asked for an amount, were told they couldn’t borrow that much😲 So they used the broker the estate agent used who got them the amount they needed. That broker was also “free”, though got commission of around £700 from the bank the mortgage was with. 

Albermarle

 I would NOT go with one as they as very aggressive and don't listen to me sending me houses £25k over what I can afford

Sending house details that do not fit the potential buyers criteria, is pretty standard estate agent practice.
I would not see it as any kind of red flag. They are hoping one might just take your fancy.

Aimez

They sent me flats, I said erm no I have a house and want another house so just don't listen. I cannot magic £25k anyway I can understand them sending me stuff under budget. I have decided to save a couple more grand at least to get higher end of 2 bedrooms market with fees and allowing for buying a few things/doing things needed to a new place, as no point moving to anything less. Obviously prices buying and selling will change but I have a far better idea now that I can actually afford to move.

I need to get more understandingnon fees as I can save there from what everyone says they try to sell the convenience package via mortgage people in thr agents. They did actually send me a spread sheet eventually but forgot first time and just sent this is how much they will lend you and this is how much max you can look at buying rather than how they got there. I am scared of all the companies on social media who give cheaper fees for everything as well.

Thanks All

Bigphil1474

Don't forget that the price you see in the estate agents or on the website is the marketing price, it's not the starting price. Depends on your price range but houses marketed £25k above your budget may still be in your budget when it comes to actual selling price. Depends on the seller. For example, If I had £300k to spend, I'd definitely be looking at anything up to £325-330k.