How to avoid time wasters?

claireac

I think regardless of what off you want to achieve or what the EA has advised you, that a house is worth purely what a person is prepared to pay for it. If you are lucky enough to find a buyer that totally falls in love with your house, then they will pay for it.

In this economic climate however I think you have been ill advised in dropping so much off the price because you think it needs a new kitchen - a prospective buyer might not agree! You would also have been a better negotiating position.

I'm in the process of selling my house and buying another (please, please don't fall through!!), and the markets are tough out there! It's never taken me so long to find a buyer, so if you are getting interest then accept it all. Definitely get the EA to do the viewings, it's much better to view an empty house as it feels more spacious.

Have to agree with PP - de-clutter! I have kids too and work, but it has to be done.

Kez100

I am off to look at the links provided to see if I prefer other houses to yours......

Internally, I'm liking the one on Maria Street at 119k and the two on Quarry Street below £100k more than yours.

Yours is far more attractive for me from the outside than any of the offerings and I would take that into consideration for resale. To compete with the internal photographs you need to de-clutter, definitely. Unless Quarry Street is a dive I think you'll struggle with your much higher asking price while those two are on the market (although I see one has SSTC)

Imp

The house is worth £x to you.
To a buyer it is worth £y.

If £y is greater than £x, you will sell it. The buyer wants to buy it for as little as possible. You want to sell it for as much as possible. The £105,000 has opened negotiations to try and find out what £x is. You can continue negotiating and find out if a sale is possible, or go off in a strop and act all insulted.

I am currently looking for a house to buy. I almost ignore the asking price, that is just an invitation to make an offer. I make offers based on what the house is worth to me.

To give you some perspective, I made a serious offer of 65% of the price of one place. I am a serious buyer, and hate wasting my time going round houses, but I will only buy at a price I am comfortable with.

sugarwalsh

Wow, does anyone knowhwere you can get this kind of advice? I would love some impartial advice on our property!

LillyJ

When we were looking, all the sellers thought we were time wasters when we weren't! Because we both look younger than our age (23) and were looking at 2-3 bed semis, people seemed to think we were just a couple of kids in a new relationship having a nosy! Even the estate agent was sceptical at first.

It is just as annoying the other way round, and you could see people's face drop when 2 "kids" turned up at their doorstep trying to buy their house!!

brummybloke

Austin_Allegro wrote: »

How does that work? If sellers refuse to sell and buyers refuse to buy, it's not a market at all!

Buyers aren't buying because 1. they can't afford (borrow) the high amounts required and 2. they don't want to anyway because they are expecting falls in the future.

If all sellers refuse to budge on price, they won't sell anything until:

a. lending loosens up (100% mortages etc become available again or some crackpot scheme like 100 year mortgages starts up) and/or

b. Wages increase.

Neither of which look particularly likely in the near future. Even assuming (a) and/or (b) happen in the next few months, it's possible there will have been forced sales (repossessions etc) of those sellers refusing to budge on price, thus setting the precedent for lower prices all round.

I understand it's not a pretty picture for sellers but I don't think being unrealistic with offers which are only about 12% below asking (when the IMF have concluded that UK property is 30% overvalued anyway) is going to help anyone.

weird, i dont recall saying people refusing to sell?, i said people refusing to lower the price, completely different. it is then down to the person WANTING a house to meet the demands of the seller, if they dont then they dont get the house THEY WANT.

do porsche cut the prices of their cars by 30% because some people wont pay the asking price or close to it? no, they wait for serious buyers and by serious buyers it makes me chuckle " i offered 65% of the value, i am a serious buyer" is NOT a serious buyer, it sounds more like someone who checks the local papers for deaths and then checks out where they lived, in the hope of taking advantage of someone vunerable still at the property. im not accusing the person who i quoted of this but to try and insist a serious buyer with such a stupid amount offered?

tell you what, i will offer 50p, im serious.

see? ridiculous.

PasturesNew

Fred1 wrote: »

wow! looks nice - you'd certainly pay more than £120k for that in South Wales!

Not necessarily. But that'd be a different thread.

PasturesNew

Don't forget though, most buyers aren't looking in one street or village. Many will be eyeing up 3-4 areas and a 2 mile radius maybe.

So it's not just a question of what's in that small area, but push it out to a 3 mile radius and you could have:
£85k http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-19547375.rsp?pa_n=3&tr_t=buy - picked for size/garden space/garage

£85k http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-18347039.rsp?pa_n=3&tr_t=buy - picked for size/garden/parking

£88k http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-19597718.rsp?pa_n=4&tr_t=buy - picked for size/garden/garage

And there were hundreds more.
In fact about 250 3-bed houses within a 3 mile radius at less.

bandraoi

PasturesNew wrote: »

Don't forget though, most buyers aren't looking in one street or village. Many will be eyeing up 3-4 areas and a 2 mile radius maybe.

So it's not just a question of what's in that small area, but push it out to a 3 mile radius and you could have:
£85k http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-19547375.rsp?pa_n=3&tr_t=buy - picked for size/garden space/garage

£85k http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-18347039.rsp?pa_n=3&tr_t=buy - picked for size/garden/parking

£88k http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-19597718.rsp?pa_n=4&tr_t=buy - picked for size/garden/garage

And there were hundreds more.
In fact about 250 3-bed houses within a 3 mile radius at less.

I'm always a bit wary of going a bit further away for comparison in any urban area. Things change so quickly between areas.

Imp

The 65% was an extreme case. The house need complete renovation. Estimating for construction work is part of my day job. I did a long and detailed investigation of the house, including obtaining information about ground conditions and various surveys costing me around £500 so I could accurately estimate renovation works. I had an accurate price for a renovated property. It took me around 6 weeks of my spare time to come up with an offer price.

After all that work, I was going to put the offer in, what ever it came out at, which was basically the value of the finished work minus the cost of renovation. I was after a home, not a profit. In the end the house sold for 70% of asking price. I probably softened the vendor up for that offer!

The point being, the house is worth a certain amount to the buyer and a certain amount to the vendor. IF it is worth more to the vendor than the buyer, the house won't sell.