Nasty disagreement over house purchase

[Alittlebyte]

We are negotiating a house purchase and found a house we both like. We have been going back and forth with the seller over the past few weeks.

Our last offer was £555k which was rejected but the seller has said they will accept £558k. My husband wants to offer £556k and not a penny more. I think we should offer the full amount but my husband has refused and is adamant he won't offer more than £556k.

Am I being thick, it's £2k more and we get the house? My husband isn't moving and has called me a clown for saying "it's only £2k more."

prices have been amended to avoid outting

Oh I hate house buying. Yes, I'd probably just go with 558. But your husband's attitude is probably good because if he means it, they will probably drop down and accept the 556 (unless of course the seller is also saying to their partner 'no honey it's 558 and not a penny less!' In which case you're screwed!)

He sounds like a charmer.

His egos in the way and it’s going to cost you that house!

how much was it listed at? ie how much have they already dropped and how much have similar properties gone for?

Depends, is £556k already breaking the bank? Because for the sake of 2k in the price bracket (I appreciate you’ve changed numbers slightly but taking it as high value regardless), it reads like your husband is either really wary of every penny around the new house, or he is incredibly pigheaded and one of these people who must have the final say. One would suggest you can’t afford this house, the other makes him sound insufferable to be sharing a very nice house with…

It's an extra 0.36%
Is your husband really willing to walk away from the purchase over it?

I really hate this sort of haggling. Can't be doing with it at all.

We're hopefully only a couple of weeks from completing on a house purchase. We offered the asking price. The estate agent came back and asked if we could offer 30k more, or even 15k. We were very direct and simple: we offered the asking price because we've no interest in haggling. They agreed to our offer.

I think I'd have walked away ages ago than to continue weeks worth of haggling. Where do the current figures sit in relation to the asking price and your initial offer?

I would say there has to be a top price you can go to. What was the initial asking price and what did you initially offer. How much have you increased your offer and how much have they dropped

Does the £2K make a difference to your financial security, OP? I appreciate you’ve changed the numbers. But if you have kept the scale and it does, can you really afford the house?

Otherwise you can offer 556 and hope they will come back with 557. Then really, really hope your husband will see reason.

Not much - it's about 3% below their asking price and houses around here have been reducing their asking prices by that much in Rightmove.

Although if you've been going back a forth for a few weeks it suggests they haven't had any other acceptable offers in which case your husband may be correct to hold out for £556.

Is he prepared to lose the house of this amount?

neighbours recently had their house on the market. Their buyer kept coming up with shit and trying to reduce the price (to be fair was after they’d already agreed a price) they told him where to shove it in the end.

Sorry hit send too soon. He them came back with ooh it’s just a misunderstanding, yes we can continue at the agreed price but they wanted nothing more to do with him. For a similar amount, he lost the house, all because he wanted to ‘win’

The sellers seem a bit odd asking for £3k more rather than a round 5 or 10. I’d accept their price but say of course it’s subject to survey and then if anything comes up there’s scope to get them to drop further. If they’ve already been screwed down to the 556 figure they will trot that out and say they’ve already dropped the price to meet you and are not reducing further.

if I were them I’d also be concerned that a) you (ie your husband) will be a nightmare to deal with if he is haggling over £2k and b) you’ve got nothing extra in contingency so you’ll be trying to get a reduction at every point including on exchange day. [edited for typos]

Your partner sounds more like he wants to win a battle than agree on a house price.

Offer it. You can always piss them about after a survey shows there's lots of work needs doing. (Some sarcasm there, but the seller should expect a bad survey to lower the price, and there's a mortgage valuation to get through first.)

Is this house ultra special or unique?

depends how much you like the house. Personally I'd either pay what they're asking or stick to my current offer and tell them to take it or leave it, not piss about any more.

What was the asking price? What was your original offer? How many times have you upped your offer and what have the increments been?
What is your budget? What does the house need doing to it? What impact on other things will it have it you pay the extra amount?

A clown?

Were you happy to listen to such insults?

It is sensible to have an upper limit that you will go to and not beyond. You should have discussed this with your husband before offering but it’s not sensible to have an upper limit of £556 K and offer £555K. There’s no wiggle room, if £556K is your upper limit then you should have offered £550-553K.

If £558K is not your upper limit, just offer it. Your husband trying to win negotiations is going to cost you this house.

@thehousewiththesagegreensofa

We have made 2 offers which have been rejected - this would be our 3rd offer. We have increased in &5k increments.
The house is very dated and will require some work.

For the sake of £2k I definitely wouldn't give up the house.
Seems like your husband is just trying to refuse on principle - is this the sort of thing he would normally do?
We had a similar situation when we bought our house and we really couldn't afford the extra £2k but we wanted the house, so we stumped up the cash and it was a significantly cheaper house so bigger % - we were first time buyers and we ended up without a TV or sofa for 2 years so it did impact us but 6 years on we are still happy in our house so I don't regret it.
Looking back we were probably in a stronger position to negotiate than we realised - do you think you could negotiate or do you feel this could cause it to fall through?

Eh, we are in the midst of this right now. It isn't fun at all. We have a little more room between us...about 10K, but my DH is a little more deliberate in his decision making and hemming and hawing, so we'll see what happens. I figure there are always other houses.

It's a dick measuring contest for him, isn't it? He's being a fool.

If this is going to be your 3rd offer it tells the sellers your really really keen so they know eventually you'll go up to £558k. Your first mistake was to do this many offers and show your hand. For the sake of looking like fools for that reason I'd just agree on 558k. Your husband is being silly.

Don’t be daft, what else was she to do, refuse to offer.😂

It's crap when it's niggling over <1% on both sides.

No it's not worth it, the sellers need to feel they've 'won' with their counter offer being accepted, so just proceed with that.