Offering £30k under asking

[whatsontonight]

Viewed a house which we love, it needs a bit of work doing to it such as new paint throughout, carpets etc. It has a new ish bathroom and an ok kitchen. We offered £30k under asking, it is priced at 210k. The estate agent seemed completely shocked we had offered this and now I'm wondering if this was a CF offer

@titchy

It's 14% below asking. Perfectly reasonable as an opening offer.

We're in the middle of a pandemic, unemployment is high and rising. The effects of Brexit have not yet been fully experienced. There is not much in the way of confidence in the market. Whatever the estate agent tells you.

Hold firm. Ignore the posters saying they'd refuse to deal with you. In reality they wouldn't refuse if you upped your offer.

I dont know where you live but houses are selling very rapidly here

People buying whilst they can maybe

The whole process seems to have worked as it should - OP is paying around what she thinks she should be paying and got there working on a process.

Im sure we did the same!

Strikes me that a way to find out whether the vendors are going to be emotional and weird is to make a low offer. Vendors who calmly decline and make it clear it's too low, fine. Vendors who act like they have been horrendously insulted and cannot believe you have dared to undervalue their beloved house... not fine, run away from them. It works both ways.

Sorry if I was selling and someone offered that much under the asking price I would be insulted and would turn it down, houses round my way are going for that and more over the asking price. My sister in law and had someone offer a way below asking price to then up offer to full asking price as they were desperate for the house, then just before contracts being signed changed there offer again to £30k below asking price as they wanted to Xyz to property and could not do it with paying full price . They lost the house completely as my sister in law pulled out of sale.

@unmarkedbythat

Strikes me that a way to find out whether the vendors are going to be emotional and weird is to make a low offer. Vendors who calmly decline and make it clear it's too low, fine. Vendors who act like they have been horrendously insulted and cannot believe you have dared to undervalue their beloved house... not fine, run away from them. It works both ways.

This. We sold a family member's house recently and I wouldn't have even thought to have reacted like some of the posters here to the low offers - good on the buyers for trying, to be honest.

A friend of mine got a house that had been on the market for 3 days for £20k below asking price (of £150k, so more than 10%) simply because she was cheeky and asked, and being a FTB put her in a better position. The estate agent seemed visibly annoyed about it but the seller wanted it sold quickly - if she'd gone in at the maximum she could have paid, she'd have been 20k worse off.

Shy bairns get nowt!

30k for carpets and chipped paint wow. I thought you were talking about ripping out kitchens and bathrooms .

Depends on many things really, say if a house is completely overpriced for the street/area or one sold recently in similar/better condition for closer your offer then no it isn’t cheeky. If a house has been on ages is usually a very good sign it is overpriced.

When we were looking to buy we only ever offered what we thought it was worth having done our homework. We lost out on maybe half a dozen houses that were overpriced but the owners were deluded by the estate agent that they’d get more. These houses all sold for what we offered or less in some cases months down the line. We were glad we didn’t up our offer as it wasn’t worth more.

When you offer lower than the owner wants it does sometimes get their backup. We actually put our offer back on the table for one house after it’d been dropped a few times after us offering on it months before with the same offer. We were first time buyers ready to go ASAP so good buyers, the sellers went with another offer that was the same as ours (we saw what it sold for in the end), the estate agent tried to play us off the other buyer to go up but we said no. I guess they felt we’d messed them about not increasing our offer months before.

Mine is on for 370K I'd consider anything over 350K.

For 210K -180K is a low offer. 30K for new paint and flooring -max of 5K I would say -maximum and that's absolute maximum if you repainted the house and replaced the carpet.

Our house was originally up for 220, we had our eye on it and EA kept dropping until it went to offers over 200, we finally viewed and went in at 193, then 194 and settled at 197. This was 2014 when the market was slower with lower prices. A house is only worth what someone is willing to pay. Be prepared to negotiate a bit but don’t tuck yourselves up and overpay. The market is ridiculously high at the moment. Has it had much interest? Have you checked sold prices for the road/area? Can you move quickly? What is your position?

You've been lucky OP. I wouldn't dream of entering into negotiations with someone who'd offered 14% less than the asking price, if the property was appropriately valued.

I was going to offer mine for a realistic price but maybe I need to add on 10% so that the people who like to play games can feel like they've won if I drop it to the asking price I really want.

@rawalpindithelabrador

They've been very generous with you and I'm glad it worked out for you. We had someone do this with a house we were selling one time and we outright rejected and instructed the EA not to entertain those buyers at all again because it struck us a cheeky and time wasting and really didn't want to deal with game-playing buyers. It's a risky strategy.

How on earth have they been generous? They are getting what they want for their house, they aren't giving the OP charity. And time wasting? One phone call from the agent to say we have an offer for 180 the vendors go we will take 197 the op says fine. That is how selling things goes.

Congrats op, I hope it all works out for you!

@Calmandmeasured1

You've been lucky OP. I wouldn't dream of entering into negotiations with someone who'd offered 14% less than the asking price, if the property was appropriately valued.

I was going to offer mine for a realistic price but maybe I need to add on 10% so that the people who like to play games can feel like they've won if I drop it to the asking price I really want.

It's not a game. If your house is overpriced then you'll get offers below what you're hoping for.

Houses are only worth what people are prepared to pay. That's not cheeky, it's business.

I was going to offer mine for a realistic price but maybe I need to add on 10% so that the people who like to play games can feel like they've won if I drop it to the asking price I really want.

It could also backfire though & you might need to reduce to get any offers.

We're about to enter the mother of all recessions. I cannot believe how fast houses are selling. There are going to be a lot of people in negative equity by 2023, so a low offer is wise.

On one hand if you don't ask, you don't get but if I was the vendor, unless I'm absolutely desperate to sell, I'd be worried about dealing with you for fear of 11th hour problems.

@IndecentFeminist

Sounds like a perfectly sound first offer to me. Doesn't everyone under offer first off with the potential to come up?

No. I don't play games. If I want a house I make a sensible offer. I find myself shouting at Kirstie and Phil on the TV at times when they tell the buyers to make silly offers. If you want the house just offer what you think it's worth. OK that might make me less financially savvy but I wouldn't lose a house I wanted to save £5k.

However, the OP's offer might be a sensible one, we don't know without having local housing market knowledge.

Ultimately you offer what you are prepared to pay. If the seller wants more then you either decline or find more cash down the back of the sofa.

I am staggered at how offended some people seem to get over offers. It's the assumption that the price is accurate, there seems to be no expectation of stretch pricing, the offence being taken seems crazy. It's a transaction.

Well done OP - I bet you're glad you didn't post before you made your offer.

@whatsontonight

We really like this house for the size of the garden and the bedroom sizes. It is at the lower end of our budget but we can't find anything with this size of plot, it is just outside of the location we hoped to buy it, none of this relevant to the vendor. Hope we can meet at 195k however we would probably still buy it at asking. Hope for some kind of deal though

Personally I never gave a counter-offer as a seller. I just said 'no'. If you are willing to pay £195k it might have been best to have offered that straight up. A lowball offer might have annoyed them enough to write you off as not serious.

We're about to enter the mother of all recessions. I cannot believe how fast houses are selling.

I do find the dichotomy of this odd.
Although I know 1 person who rushed into buying first lockdown because they know redundancy was coming their way. And 3 people who bought on furlough rather than wait in case their hours were reduced/made redundant.
Also heard someone on the radio who was in the process of buying but had just lost the job however then the stamp duty break came & it meant they could do it.

Doesn't everyone under offer first off with the potential to come up?

considering sold prices don't match asking price I said it was normal to offer under.

I think haggling is always part of the process of buying a house, but id definitely reject a £30k reduction on asking price (but that's just me). The least I went on my old flat was £1.5k because I needed every penny out of the sale to buy my house, which I knocked £10k off (but it needed a lot of work and came back in the survey, they were desperate to sell as it was their 2nd rental home). Different circumstances will determine how much a person will be willing to drop.

However to say you'll need new carpet and paint throughout i'd think thats all a given. That is all cosmetic not structural or building related (we needed to re-roof and re-plaster walls) so if someone suggested a £30k drop because they didn't like the existing interior design would make me think CF!

It's all a bit of a gamble though isn't it? Make a low offer and you might annoy the people, or you might get lucky. If selling, accept a lower offer or hold out and risk it not selling for ages and/or ending up with less.

I'd have thought make a pretty irresistible offer if your heart is set on the place/if it would be difficult to find somewhere else, and accept a lower offer I'd it's been on for ages or you you have a desperate need to move.

But if there is no deep emotion/need involved, then it's just upto each person's level of risk they are comfortable with surely. There are no rights and wrongs with this.

I'd file you under CF and refuse to engage with you further.

I think you were fine! Offer what you are prepared to pay, if you are not desperate see what they are prepared to sell for.
Its EA job to get highest price (and "reaction" caused you to consider revising up your offer - so it worked!!).

We offered 30k less than asking price and offer was accepted. 5 years on we are selling and one of the estate agents has said we will likely sell it for what we paid, which is depressing.

Wish I'd asked for 40k off!