Found a house we love - but not sold

willis

My husband and I have found a house we love. It's absolutely perfect and within our budget.
However, no one has made an offer on our house yet. We've been on the market for around 3 weeks. We've had around 5 viewings in that time.
Does anyone have any advice please?

We really don't want to lose the house. It only came on the market a few days ago. There is no way we can afford to be paying 2 mortgages while waiting for our house to sell. We can afford to accept an offer on our house rather than the full asking price though.

What should we do??

Thank you.

Nenen

You could try:
1) posting a Rightmove or EA link here for us to give comments (and also advertises it more);
2) dropping the price, particularly important if you are on a 'threshold' for rightmove;
3) speak to your EA and ask them if they will be very proactive (this will be even better if they are also the agents for the house you want as they kill two birds with one stone)!;
3) Ask EA to hold an 'open viewing' next Saturday. A house we went to see at an open viewing last Saturday attracted lots of interest and went to sealed bids the following Wednsday... it was sold immediately!
Good luck

Grandmasu

I work for an estate agent, usually if anyone is in this position, they can put an offer forward and if the vendor accepted they would be advised to keep the house on the market and continue viewings in case someone was able to proceed more quickly.

It is possible that you might be lucky with the sale of yours especially if you are prepared to take offers, however the market is not as fast as it was and it could take you longer than you hope. (Don't forget this also applies to the person selling your dream home)

Hope this helps a little.

gingin_2

Grandmasu wrote: »

I work for an estate agent, usually if anyone is in this position, they can put an offer forward and if the vendor accepted they would be advised to keep the house on the market and continue viewings in case someone was able to proceed more quickly.

It is possible that you might be lucky with the sale of yours especially if you are prepared to take offers, however the market is not as fast as it was and it could take you longer than you hope. (Don't forget this also applies to the person selling your dream home)

Hope this helps a little.

Hi Grandmasu :hello:

what's the sentiment at your Estate Agency? Are the agents telling sellers (and perhaps buyers) to be more realistic and are sellers panicking or totally oblivious to anything happening in the market, do you sense it slowing? Or is it ticking along nicely?

Just interested to get any info from someone "in the know"

Edit : sorry OP if this takes away from your thread....I guess the only way to sell the house is to offer it at a price that buyers would snap it up at....

willis

Thanks for the replies. If we make an offer and the house is kept on the market until we sell/someone proceedable offers, would this be to our disadvantage? i.e, would the agent tell all viewers that there's been an unproceedable asking price offer, therefore making people a) not hang around if they want to make an offer or b)more tempted as someone else wants it, implying it must be a good area/price/house etc?

Would we be better off keeping quiet until ours sells?

merlinthehappypig

To be honest we never even look at other houses before we are in a position to proceed, to avoid precisely the sort of situation you find yourselves in.

There is nothing you can do unless the seller is prepared to wait for you.

If another offer comes along, you are powerless to do anything.

I'd concentrate on getting yours sold, Nenen has some decent tips in her post, and forget about the one you like for now. If yours sells and the one you want is still on the market then great. You will be in a better position to negotiate as well.

[Deleted User]

willis wrote: »

Thanks for the replies. If we make an offer and the house is kept on the market until we sell/someone proceedable offers, would this be to our disadvantage? i.e, would the agent tell all viewers that there's been an unproceedable asking price offer, therefore making people a) not hang around if they want to make an offer or b)more tempted as someone else wants it, implying it must be a good area/price/house etc?

Would we be better off keeping quiet until ours sells?

You have a good point there, I think I would keep quiet until you have an offer on yours (with a complete chain behind).

Doozergirl

I don't believe in making offers until you are ready. It makes you look desperate, they know you can't proceed and so they're not so eager to barter with you; you won't get their best price because you will be overeager to offer high.

Then, they can brag to viewers about how they have an offer from some people who really love the house, blah, blah and I think people genuinely feel happier buying a house that they know someone else wants.

I had people buy a house from us who offerd full asking when they hadn't sold, then, a week or so later when they had, they tried to barter. Of course I knew they could afford asking price and so I hung on for it (all of fifteen minutes it took).

Margaret_Skinner

Would there be any mileage in putting in offer in with a pretty late entry date - say 2 months ahead or something like that? It would give you time to sort out what you need to do and drop the price of your house if you still have no luck if necessary.

Nenen

gingin wrote: »

what's the sentiment at your Estate Agency? Are the agents telling sellers (and perhaps buyers) to be more realistic and are sellers panicking or totally oblivious to anything happening in the market, do you sense it slowing? Or is it ticking along nicely?

In case this helps you Gingin... We went viewing several houses yesterday and met a seemingly (half) honest EA. We heard another viewer ask him what was happening to the local housing market and he replied that they have seen a small decrease in prices recently which they anticipate continuing until September and then his agency think the market will 'level off' for some time to come.

When we spoke to him about the house (it was marketed for 250K and had been lived in by an elderly gent and very neglected) he told us that he had sold the son's house of the same design (but with an extension and in very good condition) just up the road for 335,000 a year ago and then added 'but I doubt I'd get that in today's market'! I couldn't believe an EA was admitting to buyers that the market was dropping. However, thinking about it, in our local property magazine, several adverts from EAs make reference to 'the current challenging market'. I guess that is tantamount to admitting in print that things are slowly beginning to fall.

jackieb

Margaret_Clark wrote: »

Would there be any mileage in putting in offer in with a pretty late entry date - say 2 months ahead or something like that? It would give you time to sort out what you need to do and drop the price of your house if you still have no luck if necessary.

I did that last week. I asked for a long entry date and my solicitor suggested an entry date of the last Friday in April. It can be done. It depends if the sellers are in a hurry to move. The house I put a bid in for had a closing date (sealed bids). I put in an offer £13k over. I don't know what it went for but my solicitor had been told we lost it by quite a bit.