Making an offer on a house

[Sundaynightterrors]

Looking at buying our first house. We’ve seen one today that says offers over £290k where would you pitch your first offer?

How long has it been on the market? What’s your budget? Does it need work? What do similar local houses cost? Is it one of a kind, would you be gutted to miss out? How long have you been looking? All these things matter.

Best advice I’ve read here is what price would you be gutted to hear it’s gone for and you’ve missed out on it.

Do your research. See what comparable houses have sold for recently and check they are similar enough. Then offer a few thousand below to give yourself wiggle room. So if other houses have sold for around £275-300 then you may want to start at £275 and think your top amount might be £285 (whatever you’d feel comfortable paying). I’d ignore the offers over especially if it’s Been on a number of weeks. If it’s fresh they’ll want to test the market for longer so are unlikely to go low, but you never know. Make yourself as attractive a buyer as possible: mortgage in principle, proof of deposit, a solicitor lined up. Remember the agent works for the seller and will try and get the best price for them, not you, but an offer is better than no offer, and in many places in the UK it’s a buyers market.

Are you in England? Scotland is different.
They can ask what they like but the buyer will set the price. It’s very helpful to find out their circumstances. They may not sell at all if they don’t get the price they want so ideally they are serious and motivated.
My neighbours have been trying to sell for nearly a year. They are asking ‘offers over’ and they haven’t had any.
Friend just bought one. Was originally 425. Then offers over 400. Whatever she offered right up to 420 was rejected. They wanted 425. She wanted the house so has paid that.
So it all depends. Who are they and what do they want and who else might want it and how long has it been on? Good luck.!

I dislike offers over and I think most people do. Offer what you think it’s worth, after you’ve researched recent sold house prices for similar properties.

Totally depends on how much interest there’s been in it, how much you can afford to pay and how much you want it.

I would try to gauge if there have been other offers or second viewings, especially if it’s a relatively new listing. If it’s been on for 6 months already, that’s different.

For example, we bought our house in a very fast moving market. There were other offers going in at the same time. It was listed at £750k. We offered £820k. I was really pleased with that. We’d been trying to buy for 2 years and missed out multiple times and had one purchase fall through due to sellers pulling out. If it had been a slower market and we were less desperate, I would have probably offered £760k.

You are not in a chain so attractive. If proceedable (AIP and money ready to go) and there are no other offers, I might offer £290k to start and see what they do if it’s been on several weeks/months so far.