Aibu to write to the house seller?

I think if the house hasn’t sold in so long, they might not be overly interested in moving until house prices rise. I am seeing many houses sitting on the market, reduced or relisted in my area because people believe their house is now worth XYZ - in reality, houses are worth what people can afford or are willing to pay.

As a seller I wouldn’t be offended by a letter, but if I were you I’d just tell the EA that’s your offer and keep looking. The seller can take it or leave it.

Excuse me?
You’ve gone to the very last post of this thread and decided to randomly quote me, even though I just echoed the sediment of 90% of the posters on here to explain what exactly?
Maybe quote the Op and ask her why her research is telling her the house is over the
market value for the area? Ask her to explain herself.
You’ve also not quoted anyone else or the posters who told the Op to do it. Maybe ask them why they feel that she should do it?
The only person being ‘abusive’ well bullying right now is you.

This. You may offend the vendor. I had someone try to bypass my agent, write to me and then turn up on the doorstep. I couldn't get rid of him fast enough. People employ an agent for a reason.

I sold to someone else after that.

Do it. We did and it worked for us. Turns out the agent was utter shite and not passing all offers on.

Price is what the buyer will pay. Seller is not compelled to sell at low price, why would they?
A schmaltzy letter is really cheeky subterfuge to get a price reduction

What?

The housing market is inflated, the growth on these homes is unnatural. You can ask what you want, doesn’t mean you’ll get it.

Also I didn’t tell the Op to write the letter.
Some Vendors do like to sell their family home to a family over an investor. Where a letter could be helpful

Obviously one will sell at best possible price
Not just sell because of a schmaltzy letter asking for a reduced price because op can’t afford the ask price

Sometimes I feel it could be helpful, in this situation I don’t think it will.
The sellers and EA are trying to continue to support the inflation of the market and get well more than they are asking for.
The letter won’t help cause they know they are being a CF.
I would just wait patiently, it will backfire on them and they won’t sell. Most people don’t have the money anymore to join in on the market atm.
The vendors will learn hard way.

It is, it really is. In fact as analogies go, that one makes the point well.

Thing is, we are all different. You say that you "don't understand" why writing a letter might be rude, and that's because you'd not be unhappy to receive one. Fair enough. But that's not likely to be everyone else's take, as has been explained in the replies you've had.

You also say you don't understand why people want to communicate only through the agent. I do. If nothing else, they are being paid a lot of money to do a job, and when I've bought & sold I've always expected the agent to earn their fee. One house I sold because of bad neighbours - I didn't even want to meet my buyers, let alone speak to them, as I wanted nothing to do with the process (and unless someone has sold a house knowing the neighbours were from hell, no one can understand the worry and embarrassment that can be felt by having to off-load the problem onto some other unsuspecting bugger).

It could also be that their insistence that communication is via the agent only is a polite way of saying they don't want to speak to you again.

I agree that it is area dependent and have said so on previous posts. I don't think many areas are rising quickly though. It's nothing like 2021 now.
The ONS HPI figures are getting constantly revised down and the degree of revisions has increased considerably. They are pretty unreliable. There is a poster called Mark Tabrett who analyses their data and covers this on X if you are interested. I would suggest that things are worsening economically at a faster rate and visibly so. This is why I can't see rapid rises; the opposite, in fact.

I wouldn't bother as it sounds like they have been quite clear

Hi OP, I've been the vendor in a situation which was similar. I was offered 400k less than the asking price. The estate agent reported back that they thought it was overvalued and theirs was a perfectly reasonable offer and we'll just have to lower the price later on, so we might as well sell now. I just ignored it to be honest. I thought I'd never sell to someone so difficult, so thankfully they were miles off.

We got an offer 50k less than asking price 4 weeks later.

Selling a house takes such a long time and there are so many points of potential failure and upset, I really wouldn't start with putting in an offer widely off the mark and then contact the vendor. It's a bit odd in the nicest possible way.

You my friend are a cheeky fucker! Sorry I'm sure you're a lovely person but you are a cheeky fucker!

I am quite interested in the market psychology. We have lived in and love our house for almost 30 years. But it is not close to friends and family so we would like to move. But our current house is so wonderful, we are struggling with all the compromises we would have to make.

Exactly. The difference in commission is insignificant compared to the hassle of having a house on their books for months on end that's not selling because it's overvalued.

They'd much rather take a marginal reduction in commission for a faster sale.

They can't negotiate with you outside of their estate agent because they'll have signed an agreement to that effect.

I was selling a house when we had an offer of 10% below asking
No way would I sell to that person as I deemed they were chancers and timewasters
They eventually came back and offered close to asking price by which time we had other offers and had no interest in dealing with them
Problem is the agent may also think you are a time waster now and not take you seriously

Again, this is hugely area dependent and reduced asking prices don't mean anything unless actual sold prices are lower. The House Price Index shows that sold prices increased in the UK last year in most regions and some showed strong growth. Last year wasn't a great year economically and interest rates were higher than they will probably be going forward.

How do you know that do you check the address on Land Reg.
Also if the vendor sells to you after you have been introduced by the agent they will be sued by the agent of they find out and will be liable for solicitors and court costs
They are certain to do so when they drive by maybe months later and see you leaving the house
The vendor would be insane to sell to you

When you say you've sold you mean that you have a buyer, but the sell isn't really completed and done?

Maybe they have some specific house in mind which they would like to buy, but can't afford it if they sell this for less than X. In such case either they find a buyer who is compatible with their plans or stay there.