To think that the offer I just made on this house was not to be snorted at derisively

[LaurieFairyCake]

I am rapidly going off estate agents

House is on at 289, only one house in a row of about 300 houses has gone over the stamp duty threshold and it sold at 270 last year - it was a 4 bed detached, now it would be worth according to Zoopla 284.

I've offered 249999 on a 2 bed detached. On a busy road. That's been on 4 months. With 20 steep stairs up from the road to the front door thus putting off people with young children and the elderly (its a bungalow). And we have a very short chain as our buyer has cash.

Is that er..... snortable ?

[LaurieFairyCake]

We really can't go over the threshold and we'd be daft to - it needs a new kitchen, bathroom, extra bathroom in the loft and a proper dormer window to turn it into a 3 bed house. Plus redecoration and carpets.

If we got it for the stamp duty (250) and spent 20k on the above we still would be very unlikely to make our money back.

Someone asked me earlier why offer so much when 3 beds go for 220/230 - good question. This house has more potential and is detached and crucially the seller is a really nice elderly man whom we wanted to show we were serious and not piss him about.

DH wanted to offer 240 and work our way up to 250 but I convinced him we should make the strongest offer we could to show the very nice vendor we were serious.

I was kind of hoping the estate agent (who knows it's a strong offer, who knows that they don't go over 250) would see it was the strongest offer possible and put that to his client.

That's certainly what our agent did - we put ours on at a fixed price (stamp duty threshold) even though our own agent said we could piss about putting it on at 275k and sold it at the fixed price in 8 days.

[lozster]

Ignore. Ignore. Ignore. I had the keys to my current house (minus the garage - yeah thanks for that) thrown over a desk to me with the comment 'you've stolen that place'. Did I care? Not a jot as i got it at below stamp duty when the price started at 300k, slipped to 275, then to 265. It needed extensive renovation and an extension to replace a leaking dormer. If i had paid over, not only would I have had no money to do any of this, I'd now be in negative equity.

[Mimishimi]

What lljkk said. The agent might have been snorting because he knows you know it's worth less but he can't convince the owner of that. Don't contact them again and if they come back to you, lower your offer further still. We offered well below the advertised value of our place and it was accepted pretty quickly - it's not rude to lowball.

[AprilFoolishness]

You're a cash buyer? I'd be pretty pissed off if an agent selling a house of mine snorted at any of those in this market. He's playing a game, but he's also a twat.

[Justfornowitwilldo]

Ignore the estate agent. Zoopla's current valuations are total bullshit though.

[TiaMariaandSpringCleaning]

Of you really like it, view again and tell the vendor directly that you've made an offer of 250 but that's your ceiling. That way you know they know about it (some EAs don't pass on all offers) and you can gauge the reaction. It might be worth hanging on for a while if you can too.

What's a 'snortable' offer today they may bite your arm off for in a few months time - this happened us - vendor was very rude and basically said not to view if we wanted to negotiate on price - so we didn't. Got a phonecall 5 months later from EA saying that the vendors were dropping the price by over £30k (!!!), were happy to negotiate on that and would be like to view. We didn't!

[BreathingLessons]

I don't think it was a ludicrous offer. I think you can offer what you like. It's their choice to turn it down or accept it. NEVER be afraid to make an offer I say. They can always say no. At least they can say 'we've had an offer'. If it's on at 179k you can assume that they might sell for 160 if it's been on the market a while, and then say if your finance is in order or your a cash buyer then no harm going in with 150. that's my opinion. NObody is forcing the buyer to accept. Ddi the estate agent pass on the offer?

[WileyRoadRunner]

Until the EA has put the offer forward to the vendor he shouldn't be snorting.

You may still yet get the last snort.

[BreathingLessons]

I totally agree with Aprilfoolishness. The vendor should be very annoyed if your offer wasn't passed on.

[Quangle]

He's an idiot. EAs are there to be snorted at, not do the snorting imho.

I got and offer £200k below the asking price on my flat so I snorted at my EA when he told me I should accept. I got a close to asking price offer the next month and after I'd snorted at him and kicked him up the backside.

[Quangle]

PS your offer was v reasonable.

[valiumredhead]

Zoopla is tosh.

[WileyRoadRunner]

Ask for confirmation of the formal offer in writing from the EA.

The EA is bound to put the offer forward unless the vendor has clearly issued him with instructions not to put forward offers less than £x.

Of course you have to bear in mind the EA would have most likely told the vendor is was worth £280k+ to get them to sign with them.

We sold with an online agent. Paid £550 up front. Sold within 2 days for asking price and we will be moved out in 7 weeks from offer to completion.
Much better than the commission the local agents wanted....

[thegreylady]

Just make sure that the EA put your offer to the vendor.If you are in any doubt then you could put the offer in writing and send it to the vendor.The EA may have a hidden agenda.

[Chandon]

Perfectly reasonable to try.

We offered 20% below the asking price. Then the seller got back saying " can I have your final, and real offer". We then offered a price 10% below asking.

He accepted.

It is all a bit of a game, and an offer like yours or mine, is just a bid to start negotiations IMO.

And snorting would not bother me, it is just part of estate agent intimidation tactics to get you to offer the asking price.

[Want2bSupermum]

IMO your offer is too high. If a 4bed went for 270k your offer of 250k for a 2bed is a high. Given the work you need to do to get it to a 3 bed I would say you should go back with an offer of 220k. GBP30k is reasonable for adding a bedroom and putting in new kitchen and bathroom.

[noblegiraffe]

We bought our house at the stamp duty limit, refused to go any higher and they came back and accepted.

We just found out that some people we know offered 30k more than us a few months before and were rejected!

The owners must have been well pissed off. Might explain why they removed the toilet roll holder from the wall when they left!

[propertyNIGHTmareBEFOREXMAS]

Yanbu.

[BalloonSlayer]

"I've certainly picked the best agent when houses have been listed with two."

Me too.

We looked at a house in our village, really liked it, made an offer, then found that someone else had already made one which ad only been provisionally accepted because their chain was not complete (neither was ours.) The EA had made no mention of this and we had asked. Presumably they wanted us to race for the prize, something I would not have been prepared to do. The other people's chain completed the next day anyway. I never forgave the EA for letting me get all excited about a house and making plans when someone else was poised to buy it.

They had been sending us details of another house. So had another agent. Eventually it dawned on me that we should look at it. Which agent did I call? The one who had sent us the details of the house first, and who had the best description and pictures? Uh-uh. We went with the one who had not lied to us. And bought the house through them and they got the commission. Ha!

[ZillionChocolate]

I think ideally Balloon slayer you should follow it up by telling the liars how much commission they've lost out on and why!

[Elquota]

YANBU. They're getting enough commission to be polite to potential customers.

[IgnatiusSprat]

YANBU - nothing ventured nothing gained. Our house was on for £280,000 which was waaaaaaaaaay over our price range. It's a 4 bed detatched and we'd been looking at 2/3 bed mid terraces. We came to look round it because my friend is an Estate Agent and kept telling me I'd 'love' it. I did indeed but nearly fainted at the price. She convinced us to put an offer in of.... £228,000 and we fucking got it! We've been here two years now and it hasn't fallen down or anything so I'm not sure why the seller plumped for us, but she did, and if my friend hadn't talked me into it we'd never be here. So there you are, not every low offer is a silly offer...

[Casserole]

Did you get it?

[OhDearNigel]

The 4 bed may have needed complete modernisation, a new roof, new wiring, central heating, bathrooms. It may have had subsidence, dry rot or all manner of other serious problems.

Our house is up for sale at the moment, someone offered £20k less than teh asking price because a house in the same row had been sold very cheaply last year. He saw it on fucking Zoopla. Of course, what Zoopla didn't say was that the house was full of woodworm, has a collapsing chimney, wooden windows that are falling apart, cramped and tiny rooms, a kicked-in front door, original 1890s plumbing, needs a new roof and is generally in a terrible state of repair. Whereas ours has a £3k bathroom, has been knocked out and rebuilt completely, brand new windows, central heating, wiring, flooring, everything.

[Pickle131]

Would he have snorted if you had rounded up to 250,000? SDLT only goes up above this, his snort may have been also because you didn't know that. That said, I had an EA point this out to me in a much more polite way!