Lovely Landlord is considering selling the house we rent to us

[NoFrills01]

Has anyone been In a similar situation?

On my previous post I asked about the pros and cons on shared ownership/help to buy. After exploring those options for a few weeks, phone calls and emails we still cannot seem to get much in our area.

So I got creative and brave, I took the plunge and sent a very nice email to our Landlord (we get on ridiculously well) to my surprise, she replied saying she would sell the house we rent from her to us.

It's very very early days, we know the rough value of the property, her email reads that she wants to avoid any additional costs, she mentioned giving us a "discount".

I know she has alot of property, she wants to sell some off. Has anyone been in this situation before?

Tell me everything I need to know and consider!

Amazing! I know a few people have done this, it's worked well for them.

My best advice would be to get a full survey - don't be blinded by 'we know the house, we've lived here for ages, the landlady is nice'. It's different when it's your own biggest asset, not one you can walk away from with a month's notice.

Great - get a professional valuation and a survey done.

Get valuations. Estate agents will come and value a property whether you own it or not. Just be up front with them.

Definitely get surveys. Also add any issues you have with the house (we had problems with the hot water) to be fixed as a condition of sale. Also, will the house be big enough for you over the next 5/10 years? We had a dog and baby within 2 years of buying and our house feels a lot smaller than when we moved in!

Quite a lot of landlords want to get out - this is the perfect situation all round. Just treat it as if you were buying 'normally' which means valuation, survey etc.

Hope it works out.

I got offered this many years ago, in a very "naice" area of North London - we turned it down because we couldn't afford it. It went up so much in value that I regret not begging, borrowing and stealing every pound I could. Do it!

My uncle emigrated so we rented his house from him and bought it 3 years later. We used 'sister' branches of the same solicitor (made no odds, were still crap) and a independent mortgage advisor and it was relatively easy. We had 3 valuations done, my uncle averaged the results and did take 5k off due to knowing wed need to replace the roof. All white goods were left as we had them anyway. Was pretty stress free, we produced the paperwork when needed and signed what we got given. I cant imagine our next house purchase going like that. No stress from having to move either!

We did this with our first house although the landlord was actually a family member, it was the least stressfull house purchase ever and we went out drinking on the day we completed as no need to move a single box! Very tempting not to bother with survey etc but you really should. Good luck

I sold to my tenant a few years ago. We looked at sold prices of the same places on the road and agreed a price right in the middle of the range. Still took 12 weeks to completion but it's the lowest stress transaction I've ever had.

Sounds like your landlord wants to avoid additional costs to put things right that normally would be done to get a property ready for sale - which is understandable. So just make sure that you get a price you are happy with, with that in mind. If you keep their spend down and get a good deal for you, then you can decide on your own priorities for fixes in the future. (For example - tired kitchen that you aren't actually bothered by.) Sounds like a great opportunity!

We had nice landlords offer to sell a flat to us. They even sorted out extending the leasehold which needed doing.

In the end we decided on moving area and getting a house instead.

When we moved out they encouraged us to take some of their furniture with us as well. What a lovely couple. We remember them very fondly.

You could look on the house prices index to get a valuation.

I'm assuming by 'avoiding additional costs' they are referring to not using an Estate Agent for the sale.

We did this, we did use the Agent (the Landlord had already contacted them about the sale and as the Landlords could be a bit tricky to deal with we were happy to use them as a go-between!) and it was the Agent who suggested offering the property to us first as they knew there was a good chance we'd buy it.

It did take a while for the sale to go through, not helped by the Landlords taking a while to agree a price and going quiet for a month at one point while considering our offer! As others have said, get a survey and good luck with the purchase

I did this. It was a great decision even if I do say so myself

The landlord got 3 valuations (which varied by 30 grand!) and we both had a good idea of sold prices from Rightmove and Zoopla.

I made an opening offer and we settled on a mutually acceptable price.

The big advantage for the landlord was that he saved estate agent fees and didn't need to spend any money to upgrade the house to sell it, as he would have needed to do with other buyers. I was well aware of its condition and the work that needed doing because I lived there.
I still got a survey though (might have needed it for the mortgage - can't remember) The LL knew I wouldn't be scared off by any problems highlighted in the survey (unless major, which there weren't)

It all progressed quite smoothly because there weren't any estate agents involved. PM me if you want!

We did that.
We'd just made the decision to look to buy when we had a very apologetic phone call saying our landlady had to sell (it paid for her mum's care).

We agreed that we would get 3 quotes and go for the middle one (or mean type of average if there was a huge difference) and split what would be the agent fee between us 50/50.
So we got 3 quotes, chose the average, decided the agents' fee was 3% so we got 1.5% each.

It was part furnished, so we agreed that she could claim any items that had any sentiment (turned out out to be one item in the end) but would also clear anything we didn't want and we'd keep the rest for no extra fee. We still use most of the furniture, it was very good quality.

What I would say, is that it took far longer than we expected, around 4 months, if I remember rightly. We did have a survey done-I think we needed to for the mortgage, but it did mean we could ask questions as they did the survey. However it was very smooth and we obviously didn't have to pay any moving costs.

Many years ago we were offered the opportunity to buy the Warner flat we were renting from our landlady. It was valued at something crazy like £65,000 - and despite us being given a discount of £10k on the price, we refused as we were young and bloody stupid (we also didn’t think we’d get the deposit together and didn’t even try to, mores the pity).

It sold a few months back for just under £500k. I swore. Lots.

Get it valued, surveyed and if it all comes good then go for it.

We sold our last house to our tenant.
We did have estate agent fees as we used them as letting agents prior to that.
But it was a smooth sale.
We had a valuation done, agreed a price.
I don't know if they had a survey? They lived there for a few years so knew the pluses and minuses of the house.
I would advise getting a survey done.

As landlords we had a lot of paperwork connected with gas, electricity, etc.

What I would say, is that it took far longer than we expected

Oh yes, that's just reminded me that's something to be aware of. My buying process took longer than I expected as well. I thought it would be quicker because no other parties were involved. But I think estate agents - the good ones anyway - do help to move things on, so if you don't have any involved in a private sale you need to keep the momentum up for yourself and chase solicitors etc.

We did this in the US. We had moved to a new city and wanted to rent for a year before buying to get a feel for where we wanted to live. We decided we wanted to stay where we were so we offered to buy the house from our landlords.

We had an appraisal to establish an agreed upon price as well as an inspection. We did not use a real estate agent, but we did use a title company. In my state, a title company insures the title and can also acts as closing agent to hold money in escrow pending the closing of the transaction.

We loved the house, and it was so nice to leave the closing and just go home. No packing and moving.

We did it. When we moved into our flat it was up for both sale and rent, so we knew they were trying to sell and just renting in between. So when our initial rental contract was coming to an end we wrote to the landlords asking if they’d consider selling to us. They said yes, we made an offer (slightly below market rate but only by £5k or so), they accepted. Made for a very easy process. We still had surveys done because we were getting a mortgage.

If the LL used a letting agent to rent you the place they need to check their contract as there might be a clause where they have to pay a percentage of the sale to them for "introducing" you. The LL won't necessarily then save agents fees by selling to you.

Update!

Thanks for all of your messages, very helpful!

She wants to mee the first week of June, I'm a little concerned and suprised she has decided to increase our rent today by £50 she hasnt increased it in 3 years so perhaps due, not great timing but I guess its buisness?