To think "I can't sell my property as I will lose money" for her is ridiculous

[Itsgonnabeacoldone]

Family member, she bought the flat almost 8 years ago and has had an offer for 10k less than she paid and says she can't sell for that and is complaining.

In those 8 years the only mantaince has been a new toilet cistern. After the service charge is paid and the mortgage it's less than half the cost of renting the same.

So compared with renting she really hasn't lost any money, she's still tens of thousands better off. So not sure why she is making her life difficult by claiming she can't sell. If you see what I mean?

She might not be able to. We want to sell our house, have a shitload of negative equity and the bank would have to approve any sale if the amount offered didn't cover the mortgage.

We never bought with the intention of making a profit, we just wanted a home and weren't planning on moving - but stuff happens, life doesn't always go according to our plans.

How long has it been on the market?

A property that has had nothing done to it in seven years is not going to make a massive profit anyway. It will look tired and buyers will be counting how much work they will need to do to it when considering how much they will pay for it.

YANBU. You should see it around here. Houses people bought for what is truly a pittance 50+ years ago, have had nothing done to them, and sit on the market for years and years and years because the people who bought them 50+ years ago think they're worth hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Some try to rent them out, these 4-5 bedroom houses with massive gardens and put 'No children, no pets'. And no tenants, either. They also sit there empty.

I can understand her feelings because everyone expects to make money on property and nobody likes to be a mug. But your calculation is very good and should cheer her up: After the service charge is paid and the mortgage it's less than half the cost of renting the same. So she has not lost out at all and buying the property was a perfectly sensible thing to do. Also she has had somewhere safe and secure to live for 8 years. She should sell and move on with her life. Put your calculation in an email to her and she should understand it.

I get wher she is coming from. She HAS lost money on that flat. She paid the interest rates over that period too.
However, seeing the way markets are going re houses, I would take it so she can move in with her partner.
She is also right that interest rates are going to go up.

I think she is feeling the fact that investing in a property DOES have SOME risks. And some people will end up in negative equity again (just lie during the last financial crisis).
So yes I ca; see why she is moaning. I also think this is still her best solution.

We sold our last house at an 8k loss, which was hard as when buying our 2nd house it was like starting on the bottom rung again. It was shit, but we did buy at a high and sold in a slump.

Where is this house? I'm surprised at a loss like that anywhere in UK

Prices outside London and the SE have been falling or flat since the crash and some areas haven't come back up to peak (eg Northern Ireland for one).

If it was a new build flat, it could have been overpriced compared to other properties and second hand flats so a £10k loss is not unexpected at all.

Meh. I sold my house for 20k less than I bought it for. bought at the height of the bubble in the north!

Anyway, I didn't think about it in my mind that I 'lost' money because I had 8 years of living exactly where I wanted in my nice house in secure accommodation with control over who I lived with. Also by paying a repayment mortgage I took our more equity than I put down.

If I had made ANY investment at the exact point of time I think I would have lost money given I bought just before the global financial crisis.

Where is this house? I'm surprised at a loss like that anywhere in UK

Our house halved in value. We paid £80,000 just before the crash, when we had it valued five years later it was worth £35-40,000. I've obviously kept an eye on prices in the area and things haven't really improved since then.

@BigSandyBalls2015 literally most of the country excluding London and the SE and other hot spots hasn't reached back up to the peak pricing of 2007/8 yet.

it's not just the selling price though is it - the estate agent, legal and moving fees are also sizeable.

A £10k loss on selling price is only one of the costs of moving.

The chances are she'll have enough equity in the house to cover the shortfall. So while she's not unreasonable to have a short moan, she is unreasonable to go on and on and on about it being the Greatest Hardship Ever. As you say, it's cheaper than renting!

I've sold a house for £10k less than I paid - unavoidable breakup in the wake of the financial crash. Sometimes you have to do what you have to do.

If she could possibly hang on to it then that would be the best option.

She could either rent it out in its existing condition at a reduced rate, or spend some money smartening it up, which would obviously make it more appealing to renters. It would also make it easier to sell eventually of course.

We have just finished renovating a property which hadn't had much done to it for years. New bathroom, kitchen, redecorated throughout, new flooring etc. We had 4 couples wanting to rent it and took the agent's advice about the best ones to go for. There are SO many people out there wanting to rent that financially it makes sense to hang on to a property for as long as possible.

We are hoping ours will provide for our old age!

Since 2009, you have had more of a chance of getting a return ticket to the moon than you have had of making shitloads of profit from buying a property. (excluding London.)

I knew many people - including myself - who bought a house for £65K in the early 1990's and by 2001, (8-9 years later,) it was worth £200K. (Midlands.) It had 2 massive jumps in value. Some people had loads of equity in their homes.

However, I know loads of people (this decade,) who have bought a property (some first time buyers,) and they have lost an average of £20-40K on it. I know one woman (an ex colleague,) who bought a 4 bed 1940's ex-council house for £135K in 2007 (pretty much at the peak of house prices.) In 2013, it was valued at £85K. Four years later, it is still valued at around £85K...... £50K gone, just like that.

Not all properties bought at around £135-£140K have dropped so low (many dropped maybe £10 to 20K,) but she bought in a pretty rough area, and houses really struggle to sell there. She has tried selling it twice, leaving it on the market 5-6 months each time, and dropping it to £79K, but she had no takers.

She bought it as a buy-to-let, and used the £50K inheritance her nan left her. Now the entire £50K has gone. The days of making 150 to 200% profit in 7-8 years are long gone. Doubt they they will ever return (in our lifetime anyway.)

I don't know if she is being daft because I don't know if she has done her sums.

We were prepared to take a big loss but had a point we needed not to pass. It wasn't like so many people insisted negative equity but enough deposit to buy the next house - in new area.

Moaning won't change anything for her - she needs to research and do her sums.

I would be right royally pissed off I lost money on my house.

Thankfully I live in the South East property bubble and it would need to drop by 163%.

It depends where she lives. In the South East, house prices have gone up about 50% at a minimum over the last 8 years (2008 was the height of the financial crisis) so I would never sell my house for less than i paid for it. But prices elsewhere have not had the same increase.

The estate agent is irrelevant - he wants the commission.

She would be much better off keeping it and renting it out to cover the mortgage. Rentals have gone up but mortgages are still very cheap. Then she can sell it in future when we don't have things like Brexit causing uncertainty and the economy is doing better.

yeah the estate agent is hardly impartial - £10k here or there won't make much difference to commission but a sale or no sale will!

It's been up for sale since march, this offer is 40k less than the asking price.

Big houses normally take a while to sell. That’s a long time for a flat so I’m assuming the asking price is too high. Is this the first offer on the property? She/he could risk trying to up it by a few thousand. Instead of rejecting the offer, get the agent to say you’re looking for more than that really, would they be willing to increase their offer.