Want to make an offer on a new build - How low to go

Incisor

Treadmill wrote: »

... To be honest you are wasting your time bidding 250K on a 390K house as theres no way its going to be accepted, maybe if the house is not sold in 18 months but not right now. I think people are getting carried away suggesting you may get a 35% reduction, but dont ask don't get I guess.

Bonnie says they have been ringing every week. So they should be grateful for the offer, even if they don't accept. If they were ringing me, I wouldn't feel embarrassed at offering 250 - and if I wouldn't be embarrassed, I would expect PasturesNew to tell me that I'm not offering low enough.

tradetime

Treadmill wrote: »

I bid £170,000 on a house that was priced at £189,999 just recently with no joy so good luck with that, To be honest you are wasting your time bidding 250K on a 390K house as theres no way its going to be accepted, maybe if the house is not sold in 18 months but not right now. I think people are getting carried away suggesting you may get a 35% reduction, but dont ask don't get I guess.

Was that a new build?
Personally I think it is definitely worth chancing your arm with new builds that are on the market for a while not selling, at the end of the day you have two things in your favour, the vendor has no emotional attachment to the property, no personal insult angl, it's just business, sitting on empty properties that are not selling in a falling market is costing them a great deal of money, and cashflow is tight for developers at the moment, so you may get lucky. Understand what you're saying under any sort of normal circumstaces it should be a complete waste of time, and almost worth the developer going to auction, but I'd certainly give it a go, what is it they call it in snooker, a shot to nothing?

Idiophreak

Bonnie_P wrote: »

Hi, made offer today of £250,000 as we could complete within 4 weeks (sales lady wasn't impressed and said it wasn't worth putting through as they wouldn't accept it because the plot we are interested is is priced at £390,000). Told her to put in the offer and that we would like it in writing (she said they have had a lot of interest now and that another buyer is interested in the plot we like). We told her that only 4 out of 14 have sold since Aug 07 and that we are going to rent or a year so they can take it or leave it but we want to make the offer. She wasn't very happy when we left.

Just to give you a big :money: for putting that offer in - not sure I'd have the guts to go *that* low (from the OP I was thinking 300-320)...but if you're renting I guess, what do you have to lose - keep us informed of the progress anyway....

Bonnie_P

Hi, didn't feel embarrassed as the sales lady wasn't very nice (the one we had before was very friendly so would have felt embarrassed making a very low offer to her). Said she would call us Monday but she knows they wont accept it and then asked us if we were interested in any of the other completed plots (lowest price £380,000!). We are going to email one of the sales managers/directors so we can let them know what position we are in and make the offer again Monday as I am not sure if the sales lady will do us any favours. I think she thinks it's her decision to decide if they will accept it (didn't even want to put the offer accross, maybe she wont get commission). Told her to put the offer through and that they can always contact us in a years time if they still havn't sold them all as we will be renting.

Incisor

Bonnie_P wrote: »

... We are going to email one of the sales managers/directors so we can let them know what position we are in and make the offer again Monday as I am not sure if the sales lady will do us any favours. I think she thinks it's her decision to decide if they will accept it (didn't even want to put the offer accross, maybe she wont get commission). Told her to put the offer through and that they can always contact us in a years time if they still havn't sold them all as we will be renting.

Don't appear too keen! She might have the authority to accept offers above a level, but she won't have the authority to refuse them in the current climate. She will be in more than enough trouble if she is found out not passing on any offer, however miserable. The longer you leave it the more you remove her plausible deniability for not passing the offer on. Leave it until they contact you or you are sure that she hasn't passed it on.

Toto

I'm tempted to do the same, on a new build priced at £380,000 (reduced from £400,000). I'm not a fan of new builds at all but this one is quite nice and has the space we need. I wouldn't in a million years pay £380,000 but I have registered an interest and would pay £250,000 for it. I might go and make a take it or leave it offer, but then again, I may just hang on a bit and let the builder get a little more desperate first.

skintlass

Has anyone actually achieved these sorts of discounts? I'm curious as the new builds I've been to see aren't being discounted at all at the moment.

Kez100

skintlass wrote: »

Has anyone actually achieved these sorts of discounts? I'm curious as the new builds I've been to see aren't being discounted at all at the moment.

No one will until :

1. They try and
2. The companies need to sell and are getting no bites any higher

Number 2 is a complete unknown unless you are Lord Persimmon. It may happen - it may not.

I've achieved a price of 62.5% of asking in the last crash (a desparate second homeowner) so they do happen and it wasn't unknown back then. It could get to that stage in this crash - although I suspect it will be a long time coming yet - and it will all be a case of lucky (or unlucky) timing.

If I were a builder personally with 10 to sell and offers only coming in at 250 I would be reluctant to agree as once that one was on Land Registry I'd be done for on the others and any remianing sold subject to contract too. I'd be more inclined to sell those SSTC first and then do an advertised mega sale weekend of, say, £299,950 and hope to bag more than one sale in one go rather than accepting just the one at 250k. Then again, I'm not a builder (thank goodness!) It must be a bit like playing cards at the moment.

Treadmill

tradetime wrote: »

Was that a new build?
Personally I think it is definitely worth chancing your arm with new builds that are on the market for a while not selling, at the end of the day you have two things in your favour, the vendor has no emotional attachment to the property, no personal insult angl, it's just business, sitting on empty properties that are not selling in a falling market is costing them a great deal of money, and cashflow is tight for developers at the moment, so you may get lucky. Understand what you're saying under any sort of normal circumstaces it should be a complete waste of time, and almost worth the developer going to auction, but I'd certainly give it a go, what is it they call it in snooker, a shot to nothing?

It was a new build, The sales lady told me it would not be accepted and she was right, there where also no incentives chucked in not even carpets etc @185K

skintlass

I think you're right - the developments I went to see today are now being built to order. I was also party to an interesting conversation between the sales lady and what I presume was the head contractor. He was saying that if the good builders he had onsite left as there was no work for them he didn't think thay'd get the same standard of builder back again. Also, he said that the housing crash was much worse than the previous 2 he'd seen in his career. One other thing - the discounts seem to not be there either due to the fact that they're not building an leaving empty just waiting until they have a sale.