Aibu to write to the house seller?

[ButterMelonCauliflower]

Long story short… we have sold our house but nowhere to buy. We want to stay local and understand the local housing market.
There’s a house we like but it’s out of our price range. We think it’s over-valued (massive development planned next door to the property - probably why owners are selling). The agent it’s on with has a reputation for overvaluing and the vendors are asking way more than local average increase in the 10 years that they’ve owned it. They tried to sell 2 years ago but failed. Since then the asking price has gone up for no obvious reason.
Two weeks ago we offered 18% below asking price and were rejected.
Yesterday we offered 15% below but agent says they are not willing to negotiate.

AIBU unreasonable to contact them, explaining that we love the house, are not trying to take the piss and are hoping they might reconsider?

YES you are BU. It’s their house and they can ask what they like

NO you are not BU. A letter can’t hurt as long as it’s not too bossy/pushy

Any thoughts?

I have seen Gary Stevenson, amongst other economists, make the prediction. GS said people always react with incredulity because they don't want it to be true!. i thought it sounded far fetched when I first heard the prediction but actually I bought my house in 2003 and the value had more than doubled in the 5 years before I bought it...it then increased in value by 300% in the following 10 years. over all, value quadrupled in 20 years. that is all to say that it is more realistic than it sounds

I get these letters about 4 times a year. I bin them.

Exactly this.

Agree but I think it will probably be ignored

You have nothing to lose (except pissing off the EA who may be a pain about other houses later), sounds like the chances are tiny but it will mean you don't think what if for the next decade.

yup. We bought the house I live in now a little over 30 years ago for around 120,000. Going by what neighbours sell for its now worth about 600,000

You've had a lot of responses. I agree to not send any kind of letter.
It may be that they've mortgaged themselves up to the eyeballs and cannot afford to sell for less than asking. It may be that they have unreasonable expectations about the current market. Some people actually believe a market just goes up and up, rather than up and down.

There is a house up for sale on my street. One of the neighbours who was renting, a builder, wanted to buy it and had an idea how much it was worth. He wanted to do it up himself and move his family into it.

He viewed, listing all the renovations that were needed, and put a low offer in. He'd annoyed the sellers so much, they turned his offer down, saying they wouldn't accept his offer even if he met asking price.

Not everything is about how much you're prepared to pay. Annoy the seller and you'll never own the house, regardless of how much you're prepared to pay.

100% this.

I’ve looked. The majority that do sell go for way under asking

You could always offer closer to asking, get a very detailed survey (this will cost you some money obviously) and then go back with a list of repairs and updates that will further reduce the price. This is normal anyway in the greater scheme of things. And if you're the person asking for the reductions there's no guarantee the next "buyer" won't b doing the same.

I've seen GS's predictions but I think he is very wrong on this. In the US, the large investors such as Blackrock, etc have been selling rather than buying in the past couple of years. Prices are heading downwards there too.
Previous decades are not the same as now.

I think so many agents and sellers are deluded at present and many seem to be wilfully running their business into the ground.
Still, you as a potential buyer can't change other people's minds. You can decide not to overpay. The sellers of this particular house may well regret turning down your offer but the decision is theirs to make.

You’ve made two cheeky offers, both rejected, if I was the vendor and you sent me a love letter, I’d write one back telling you to offer the asking price.

Go for it. As i always tell my boys, " dont ask, dont get"

Good luck xx

In a way I think that there is no harm in asking although I do find it telling that this is the only house that you seem to be considering. This implies that there isn't an abundance of choice and that demand is exceeding supply for the type of property you are interested in. Personally I would factor this into any thoughts you have on what the house should be priced at. Remember houses sell all the time for what some people would consider an over inflated price and others consider reasonable value. Value is in the eye of the beholder to some extent.

It sounds like they aren’t serious about selling. I’d keep em eye out for something else.

I think you would be a brave person to be against the property market even in the medium term. I think if you're currently in a stagnant or falling market it can feel like the property market won't ever recover but there are loads of areas in the UK that are rising quickly.

Do they actually want to/need to desperately sell? The once sleepy village next to us has seen an explosion in developments recently and a lot of houses that would back onto it were put up for ridiculous amounts on the off chance that somebody would buy one prior to development becoming obvious. It’s a very desirable village and it paid of for a handful of sellers.

However a lot of those houses have been on and off for the market for years and now the developments are in place they are far less desirable and have been drastically reduced in price as the ship has sailed to offload their homes at inflated prices.

Once the development is started they may be more inclined to sell.

Won't work. We did something similar 7 years ago. We spoke to them asked to negotiate. They said no. These guys will do the same. Best to go through the EA. They are the only ones with some negotiating power.

The vendors are using an agent so it’s entirely normal to communicate through the agent. Why would you try and go direct…I’d just blank you if I were them. Sure, you’re communicating with your buyer, but that’s completely different - you want to sell to them and, presumably, are happy with or have agreed a price. You are not at that stage with the house you want to buy. Once you are, which is achieved through the agent, I’m sure they’ll be happy to communicate directly with you.

But, once they’ve been rejected twice, maybe think again? Or just tell them tobe irritating in the hope the other side caves in ;)

Don't write a letter. They obviously want to go through the estate agent and a letter could make things worse
Also there is nothing you can write in the letter that they probably don't already know.