For those of you in Scotland....

Al-boy

I see whole streets of for sale signs, in sought after areas, where a year ago the property agents had waiting lists of buyers. Most of the houses were sold without the need for signage. now they sit for months. People are being refused mortgages. or offered a lower income to loan ratio, making it impossible for them to buy what they need. Also people in average incomes are taxed to the hilt, there is no residual in their income

Its_me_again_3

We have been looking at new build houses with 3 developers in the same area over the past 4 weeks. Today i received a call from Wimpy homes saying that they had released another plot for sale that we might be interested in. This particular house style has risen £3K in 4 weeks. There does not appear to be any difference in plot size.

It makes it more confusing when the new housebuilders are increasing the prices.

m00m00

they are increasing the list prices so that they can appear to offer you a better deal by knocking X% off.

it's very common with new builds, and new builds are the vast majority of price increases I've seen via propertybee

Its_me_again_3

m00moo I have never purchased a new build before. So any advice would be grateful. Does this mean that i should not just pay the list price on the house and instead try to get a discount? Any suggestions on how to go about this?

m00m00

check the various threads on new builds, or start a new specific one, plenty of people will be able to give you advice. At the moment, I would certainly be going in with an offer well below the headline price, as an opening to negotiations.

jackieb

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Where about JackieB?
Remember to post a link. Were all nosey bar stewards

I'm near Aberdeen. I'm not posting a link to my house They don't put them on RightMove up here, and you'd all see my proper address. Anyhoo, it's not a fancyshmancy one (clean, newly painted and tidy though, but no brown leather sofa, new kitchen or laminate flooring lol), and if anyone criticised it, i'd be gutted. :rotfl:

A house went up for sale last Tuesday. We went to see it on Sunday. We noted an interest, and this Wednesday we got a call saying a closing date had been set for Friday. We put in an offer. Got a call saying there had been 3 offers - ours had been the middle one. So, that one took 10 days to shift. I can't believe the speed they're going.

mitchaa

Out of interest Jackie, what % OO did you put in?

jackieb

We only put 10% over as I think the valuation must have been near the O/O price. I wouldn't have wanted to pay any more than what we bid. We had a bid in for one in February at O/O £205k and it went for £250k.

My son's friend bid 22% over, on a flat, a month ago. He wasn't the highest bidder though. It wasn't a purpose built, new build though. It was a granite one.

IveSeenTheLight

jackieb wrote: »

We only put 10% over as I think the valuation must have been near the O/O price. I wouldn't have wanted to pay any more than what we bid. We had a bid in for one in February at O/O £205k and it went for £250k.

My son's friend bid 22% over, on a flat, a month ago. He wasn't the highest bidder though. It wasn't a purpose built, new build though. It was a granite one.

Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire seems still to be very strong.
According to Nationwide (http://www.nationwide.co.uk/hpi/historical/q1_2008.pdf)
Aberdeen rose in the last quarter by an annual HPI of 13%, while Aberdeen shire & Moray rose in the last quarter by an annual 18%.

I do think that this rise will not continue. Although Scotland is still one of the second cheapest regions to buy (second cheapest I believe), a typical Scottish House is approx 16% less than a typical English house) and a wage to property ratio which is the best in the UK, the increasing number of Fixed price Properties (about 20% for the area I am monitoring) will likely hold back prices from rising much further.
Out of interest, the area I keep an eye on, all the properties that are under offer are offers over properties. It make me question the state / price of the fixed price properties.

You have done the right thing.
Bid what you are willing / can afford to pay and not any more.
If you get the property then great, if not, then likely there is a house better suited for you about to come along

Good luck.

alyth

I'm actually on a day off today as my partner and I are splitting up and I'm selling the house and have had the first estate agent round with another two this afternoon. We paid £350K 18 months ago for a 6 bed house with an acre of land - his advice - put it in at £350-£375K but we will not get more than £400K for it. He said put it on at o/o for 8 weeks then fix it if necessary - now, as I used to work for this estate agents I know that's their policy, but he said the house will take at least 3 months to sell.

It'll be interesting to see what the others say this afternoon!