To think being 'offended' by an offer to buy your house..

[slingingtothemusicinmyhead]

Is a bit over dramatic?

Currently put in an offer on a house. 15% below asking price.

It's over priced. It's priced similar to other houses on the street that have recently sold but it needs a bit of work (new kitchen, ancient electrics etc) and those houses had been thoroughly modernised.

They're offended and do not want to hear from us again.

Is this sort of hysterical behaviour now normal when buying and selling houses?

It is the result of unmitigated entitlement and greed OP.

I thought the saying goes “if they are not offended by your first offer then you have offered too much “
Sellers believe what ea tell them.
Not everyone,but a lot of sellers go with the highest valuation,they value high to get them on their books.Then get the sellers to drop after time when it won’t sell at the overinflated price.

They are being v silly - "offended" is OTT. However, as PPs have said, if the 15% discount does not really reflect the cost of the work that is needed, it is a very low offer which would make me feel you weren't a serious buyer.
This kind of offer even if it is improved, can threaten further issues after survey, for example.
"Oh, a doorstep needs replaced - we would like to knock £2,000 off the price we've agreed, please"

Also, you need to be careful of establishing a poor reputation with the local estate agents. Some friends of DS went around offering slightly ridiculous offers on a number of properties in a nearby town. The agents stopped treating them as serious buyers and although they were obliged to pass on their offers to sellers, were not promoting them, understandably, as "good buyers".

That can mean missing out on some good deals.

I think to offer 15% below is perfectly OK. If the house has just gone on the market, they are unlikely to accept. The usual pattern, in my experience, is that the person who wants to buy makes an offer, the seller usually comes back For e.g House is 400, Offer is 340. Seller says no, but £385000 ok. Buyer says can we meet in the middle and 362500.
Seller says yes, no or 370000 etc. We bought and sold houses for 30 years as a small business. The estate agent is very important in the process.

The offended thing is irrelevant. The market will only pay what the house is worth. Maybe your offer is derisory and below what the market will actually pay, maybe it's a fair price......only time can answer that question OP. They're silly to cut off their noses though if that does in time prove to be a fair market price. Sounds like they want to sit it out....or not sell of course.

I am having a nightmare trying to buy a house due to encountering lots of unrealistic sellers. I have sold in the past and was never offended by offers, just said no to some and counter offered others. The market where I live currently is dead. I am renting and chain free. Just some of my stories:

First house they bought 4 years ago for £200k and somehow decided in those 4 years despite not doing anything to it decided it had doubled in price! We came along after a year on the market without a single offer and offered 85% of the asking price they said no, then said yes, then silence for a few weeks before saying no again. It's now back on the market for £450k!

Second house owned by LL empty for 6 months already needs a ton of work but is priced higher than other recently sold houses on the street in better condition. My offer at 90% offended him so much apparently he took the property off the market!

Third house offered 90%, went to 97%, still no, wanted asking price, has now been on market 8 months.

Sellers where I live are just being ridiculously unrealistically and want gains that just don't exist. As a result nothing is shifting. A house doesn't owe you profit unfortunately.

An offer is exactly that - an offer
If sellers are going to get so offended then don’t put your house on the market
We sold our earlier this year, it was up for £525,000 and the person that bought it started off at £485,000 which, as we and they were sensible Hunan brings, negotiated to an acceptable £515,000 job done.

YABU about thinking rewiring is a bit of work! Dustiest fucking mess I have eber experienced!

I’ve been through process so many times - to answer question about whether people pay asking price straight up - yes is the answer but I live in London where pretty much everything is overpriced - we had to put a sealed bid in for our last house and we had to go over the asking price. We also commissioned structural surveyor etc which flagged issues but they said they were in no rush to sell and not negotiating on price so it depends on all the moving parts - location, circumstance of vendor and buyer etc .. unfortunately people will take it personally but I think so many people have their heads stuck in the recession (not saying you at all) and are offering stupid under the asking price. As said before if it really is overpriced it won’t probably won’t sell unless it’s someone’s forever home and they are desperate for it. Good luck! Really is the most stressful time aye!

I think it is worth reading the property auction summaries. I read one yesterday (Strettons) and the market is definitely cautious. Any seller who is overpriced and inflexible might well live to regret that. I think it was early 80s when we had the worse property situation in London. It was a nightmare. I think any reasonable buyer and seller should be sensible. If you sell for less, you buy for less (mostly).

It could be that the EA used the word 'offended' rather than convey the actual words the seller used. It could be the EA who is offended and feels you are rubbishing his/her valuation.

15% is a lot to drop and the sellers would be put off thinking you couldn't afford it or were chancers. Personally it would put me off too. I've bought and sold a lot and offers near the asking price tell me the buyers are probably very interested. I don't like game playing. Very low offers and you're just messing about.

I sold a place [totally up together, no work to do anywhere, realistic price] earlier in the year and had a stupid offer which I flatly refused. They came back with a realistic one nearer the asking price and I accepted, but nearly didn't as I don't like dealing with people who think I'm stupid. Me and my EA, who was also taken aback by the low offer, knew the value of the property and that's what was accepted.

Well, it's a buyer's market. They've cut off their nose to spite their face.

We offered the asking price straight away. It was a little under-priced, in my opinion, and I guess we could have haggled but it was in very popular area and was our dream home. There was far too much emotion involved to call it a business transaction - save that for other investments. When I saw the house I wanted, I offered what I knew would secure it for my family. No regrets.
Be sure you don't lose a home just to make a good business deal.

Also - the sellers are fully aware of the condition of their own house and probably priced it accordingly. When we sold our old house, we rejected an offer which stated the vendors had deducted the cost of new windows needed!! We lived there for 20 years - do you think we weren't aware of the state of the windows when we set the price!

The nice thing about house prices is that the sold price is available a few weeks after the sale.
We put in an offer on a house and it was declined. It was totally realistic as it's a small close and you can predict almost to the penny what they go for as they are all similar. We went quiet and a few days later we had a call from the EA asking us if we wanted to increase the offer but we said no. It had been rented out and long story short it was on the market for another 16 months and sold for what we had offered. Really annoying and they had lost a years rent.

Also - the sellers are fully aware of the condition of their own house and probably priced it accordingly.

OP said the house was dated and in need of work but priced the same as refurbished houses.

Whenever I've been buying I've come across multiple houses which were over priced by their owners, often against EA advice. It doesn't matter how fond you are of your own house - if its not worth that price to a buyer it is overpriced.

You might be happy to live with old windows but if a buyer's mortgage valuation says they need replacing that will affect the mortgage they can get and therefore the price they can pay.

Speaking from my mother in laws experience....They were selling their parents house, mum died a year ago, they grew up in that house etc etc so the house has lots of emotion attached. The house next door, exactly same house sold for alot less because they wanted it gone quick, so that means every person has tried to get it at a knock down price because of next door. One couple even said, they'd go back for another look but tell the owners that we will not be offering any more money....they'd offered 20 grand below the asking price. Cheeky effs. They managed to sell it for full asking price a week later!! So I can see why people get annoyed. You have to remember that it's their house and they accept what they want! And if you want it don't be cheeky with the offer, maybe try knock 5 off if you really like it but I would try any more than that! People are so self entitled these days it's unreal!!

I also think estate agents are partly to blame here as well, less houses are coming on to the market so estate agents are valuing high to win business. There are a couple of estate agents near me who are notorious for it and once a vendor has been given a price they are then wedded to it. I have seen a few houses that have bounced around agents for about 8-12 months, always at the same asking price where the vendor just can't accept it's the price not the agent.

I think the mentality of house prices must always rise needs to come to an end, just because Maud up the road sold their house 2 years ago for X doesn't mean yours is worth X+++.

Maybe but when we sold our house a CF offered 25%less as he wanted to build an extension. So basically asked us to pay for his extension. We didn’t want to deal with him even if he offered more as this made us think he would be a nightmare and you need some trust.

Maybe they feel similar to you. Worried you are chancers and you would just pull out at the last minute. I wouldn’t assume it is them being offended but maybe worried you not being reliable would cost them a lot of money.

You have to remember that it's their house and they accept what they want!

This is true but it works both ways. If I think a house is overpriced I'll offer what I think its worth factoring in costs of works which may be needed (and I mean needed rather than just redecorating for preference). I won't pay more than that. The owner is entitled to accept or reject just as I am when selling mine.

Its difficult when its your family home but you have to separate it from the emotional attachment which is worth nothing to the buyer.

Just been through the house selling and buying process and I do find that some people take it very emotionally. I am very much of the opinion that your house is only worth what someone is willing to pay. We priced our house sensibly based on work needed to be done on it, the location (right next to train station and OFSTED outstanding school). It sold within 2 months, we had several offers and accepted 4% under the asking price. All very straightforward. The house we bought was completely overpriced and had hardly had anyone through the door, it had been on the market for over a year, it needs quite a bit of work. We offered 12% below the revised asking price; 25% below the original asking price. The property was probate so the executors just wanted to get rid so took our offer. There's no need to get emotional, if a house hasn't had any offers on it (and there's nothing really wrong with it e.g. Horrific location, subsidence etc) then it's at the wrong price, I am hoping these vendors get a reality check on what people are willing to pay for their house

@Rn1985 - buyers are not effing entitled. Those memories and emotions mean nothing to someone buying a house they've probably seen twice for 15 minutes. If it really was about emotion your PIL would want to sell it to the right people, a young family perhaps. No they just wanted a big price for it, because they feel entitled to that inheritance. How "emotional".

Why should someone pay the asking price for a house which clearly isn't worth that given its sat on the market for months?! FTBs are struggling massively to get on the housing ladder and now the market is readjusting I am so pleased for them. Why is it the buyers responsibility to line the pockets of greedy people who would rather have housing stock sat vacant for months then sell for a reasonable price. In a country where housing stock is very limited.

Also I love you picked £5k from thin air as a "reasonable" discount. £5k on a sale price of £100k is 5% but on a sale price of £500k is 1%. Does not compute.

I agree that in my area at least there are a lot of unrealistic sellers. As I said in January we offered 5% below asking on a property which was clearly overpriced compared to similar nearby. Estate agents told us they were offended, called us daily asking us to up the offer. We are chain free, ftb, mortgage in place and large deposit ready to go. We had made what we felt was a fair offer and said take it or leave it.

9 months later and they’ve dropped to the original offer we made. Problem is that now other similar properties have dropped to 10% under their original asking price so it’s still overpriced. We haven’t re-offered as the agent was so difficult and market here is clearly adjusting.

I don’t get why it’s fine for your house to go up in value by 200k in 2 years but not ever drop? I don’t mind my property losing value as it’s easier to take the next step.

Would people really offer the asking price if you look at the history of this property. Imagine if you offered the asking price back in 2016!

m.zoopla.co.uk/for-sale/details/40202993?search_identifier=f4266ef59c1fa3013dc6b1d8d3752b0d

Depends on house value a £680000 offer on an £800000 house is unreasonable and a waste of time. There is a low offer then there is an waste of time offer.
If you still want to purchase, apologise, blame the hubby and make a reasonable considered offer x