What’s the best you managed to negotiate when buying a house ?

[Hellobellomarsh]

Just out of curiosity I am wondering how much you managed to negotiate on a house/flat you bought? What was the asking price and what did you end up buying it for ?

@Hellobellomarsh

Not buying just yet... unless an amazing house comes up but in this area not much chance of negotiating the price 🙁

It’s entirely dependent on the year, the market, the area, the house, the seller(s), the availability of buyers and their position, mortgage offers. It’s difficult to compare.

We probably over paid by a grand or two. Maybe even more. I don’t care. I love the house and they had other offers. The mortgage valuation said it was a reasonable price to pay.

We paid asking price for this house. Terrible negotiating

It was a while ago and our house was on the market at £330k. We offered £310k. They said no. We offered £313k and they accepted.

(Is our house now. We were the buyers in that story!)

This are some interesting answers, but also it must matter what year that was. If the market is bouyant, like it is now, it is perhaps less likely that a huge reduction would happen. Also, for those who have successfully negotiated down, any hints and tips would be most welcome.

We bought our house last year for £30k under asking. Had been on the market for a year at £80k more than that but had been slowly reduced.

My tip is to search for houses that have been up for sale but never sold and were taken off the market. There are a fair few around if you look on the selling sites and then check them against the sold prices. You can go back a couple of years to find things that were listed and never sold. Of course some will have been removed for genuine reasons but if you find something you like you can approach them directly and ask if they are still wanting a sale and if so, would they be prepared to deal directly with you and avoid the stress and expense of relisting for sale, and estate agent fees. The worst they can do is say no. They feel flattered, often stressed at the very idea of starting the sale process again, especially if they went down the multiple-agent route or were on for years. Sure, there might be something wrong with it and that might be why it was never sold and then removed but it can work, especially if you are looking to take on a project (my 23% under asking was found this way and a massive project that has taken five years and counting, but it worked).

135k asking price, purchased it for 102k. To be fair, the owner had left to live abroad and the house needed work. Was my first purchase, I was very pleased with myself 😊