Advice on this bad house bidding experience...

grussell wrote: »

Perhaps it’s the way you’ve worded it, it comes across as slightly sarcastic and immature. I’m 18 years old so finding this house buying stuff quite a challenge.

In terms of “countless” - let me rephrase that for you - I called the EA “countless” times with no response and e-mailed, my first bit of contact was on the third day. I run my own company and still have time to respond to calls and emails in a timely manner. I have read the reviews on Trust Pilot based on the EA that I used (in this exact location) and the reviews are saying the same thing I have said.

And I've been working as a property professional since (just!) before you were born, so please accept that my advice has a fair bit of experience behind it. At the end of the day, the EA isn't working for you, and you can't badger them into responding if they don't have an answer from their client. And as others have alluded to, it's not great negotiation tactics for you to appear too eager. If you genuinely have a deadline to work to then make it clear, but otherwise just sweat it out.

Aylesbury_Duck wrote: »

That’s odd. You were 23 in 2014.

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=5135243

Oh, is it one of those?

I know it's frustrating to have to wait a few days, and society has geared us all up to want instant responses to everything (or at least very quick), but as someone else has said you don't know what's going on in the sellers' lives.

Four days really isn't long - especially if one of them works shifts, they have been away, they are dealing with sick friends or relatives, are frazzled by Christmas & New Year, or any of many other reasons.

They may have taken some time because they may have an absolute minimum they wanted because that's what they need to pay off their mortgage and afford the property that they want next time.... And ideally wanted a bit more, so needed to think about whether they should accept your offer.

To you, the house was worth £155k - £162k. To the seller it was worth £162k at an absolute bare minimum it seems.

They didn't want to accept £161k. They didn't want to accept less than that. When they asked you for £162k, you went for several more rounds before reaching what they wanted. Even offering £161k which over the lifetime of a mortgage isn't that much, and this may have come across to the sellers as you just wanting to "win on your terms" instead of giving them what now looks like was their absolute bare minimum price. Whether that was your intention or not, again, is irrelevant -- the sellers hold all the cards and it's their choice whether to sell to you or not if you want to buy.

You then kept phoning the EA chasing them, and they may have just thought "they didn't want to give us what we needed, it's been a bit of a game, a bit of a nightmare, and we think that they may come asking to knock the price down further down the line or be too full-on for us". Whether any of that is the case or not is irrelevant, if that's how they feel then there's nothing you can do about it.

So they may have decided that for their bare minimum of £162k and potentially full-on breathing down their necks for the next few months that it wasn't worth it for them.

As the house was worth a maximum of £162k for you, and you obviously like to be on the ball and keep on top of things, whilst looking for best value --- then maybe these sellers aren't for you either, and this house under these circumstances isn't worth it for you.

No worries, move on - find the next house... At some point, you'll find a house and offer a price that the sellers are comfortable with, and you'll hopefully find sellers that are comfortable with you as buyers and vice versa.

Of course, the more relaxed you can be about the situation, the easier this may happen, and the easier on you it might be too? Not trying to be funny about this, genuinely trying to offer a helpful observation....

So how old actually are you?

In the other thread your partner was the same age as you, not 8 years older! Could be a different partner of course but as with your car thread it all starts to unravel when questions are asked.

Anyway, you've had good advice (assuming the whole situation isn't fictional) that will help others genuinely in that situation. Good luck with your house buying, whether real or not.