AIBU to think low house offers are always worth making?

[coulditbeme2323]

Why do low house offers annoy Mumsnetters so much?

Surely a cheeky offer is always wort it.

No, I disagree. Low offers are sometimes appropriate, but usually not.

When we bought our current house, there was a lot interest. If we’d offered less than the asking price we would never have even made the running. As it happens we ultimately bought for a little over the asking price because of the level of interest.

If you go too low, it could piss the owners off and they could just refuse to deal with you if there are other offers on the table.

If it’s a property that’s been hanging around for a while, or is empty and the owners just want it off their hands, or you have some other advantage (like not being in a chain), then a lower offer might be the way to go. Otherwise, no.

Only if you are sure the seller will negotiate. I know people that have had real piss taking offers and have just shut it down there and then

I'm a mortgage adviser covering London so I see all sides. There are clients who automatically want to put in a low ball offer and because they can clearly articulate why they're doing that, their offers get accepted. Others put in a low ball offer 'just because' and get knocked back by vendors who would rather sell to someone else. In a competitive market, there are times you need the vendor to be on your side emotionally as well as financially. Of course if you're prepared to lose the property then crack on but don't expect every vendor to feel the same as you.

I do disagree, I haven't heard what i would consider one valid point as to why you wouldn't start low.

Just as the market was picking up after last financial crash (around 2010) we had a house on in London for £525k. It was a fair price. Some complete dickhead came round and offered £360k. Kept putting it up in small chunks every few days. About a week later it was going to best and final, and we received three offers of £500k - dickhead being one of them. It gave me great satisfaction to turn him down and accept another offer. Dickhead had the cheek to try to gazump my other buyer the very next day by offering £510k - no way would I have accepted an offer from this knob under any circumstances. I do wonder if he ever improved his negotiating techniques after that....

Your language is fascinating: ‘Our local agents know we don't ever want to pay a fair price…’

So you really mean that? That you would never pay a ‘fair price’? That you will only ever pay less/ significantly less than what you know or believe the house to be worth?

Do you have a high success rate? Because if you do that’s amazing, though at the same time I’m now suspecting that you are possibly one of those people who are expert on everything without ever having actually done anything…

A huge difference between not paying above the odds and refusing to pay a fair price.

Because arranging a visit can be stressful. Being disturbed, especially if working from home, making sure the house is in perfect order, some time at the last minute etc... all this to then get a totally stupid offer is insulting.

We had a few of these. They were told to get lost without any consideration. If we were willing to accept such a lower offer, we would have put the price down to attract more viewings in the first place.

We do, not because we are anything special - but because the local agents we have worked with for 16 years and though know what properties to give us a nod and a wink on.

Well then I suggest you go back to school and learn reading and comprehension because quite a few of us have put down very easily understood reasons for why we wouldn’t want to engage with stupidly low offers.

We were recently selling one of our properties. Anyone who made a cheeky offer was excluded from further negotiations. One woman begged us to reconsider a sensible offer after her husband offered us peanuts, we refused any more communication.

A property is only actually worth what someone is willing to pay for it

Ah so youre making sensible offers on overpriced properties. Fair enough.

I read them, but that still wouldn't be a reason to not start low.

The worst anybody can say is no.

I totally agree. Why not? Something is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it and I think a lot on the market is overvalued by agents.

And refuse to discuss any more offers with you like we do.

No - it's more we will only go and view properties who have to sell rather than want to sell.

For example if you are a couple who have outgrown your home and you need near asking price to fund your next move then we wouldn't waste the vendors time or our time by viewing the property.

Yabu because of the "always" - the last house I viewed had 8 people making offers all above asking - in that or any similar situation when its clear the house is popular then making a low offer is just a waste of everyone's time.

If its been on a while and no obvious competition then fine but ideally the estate agent will have already discussed with the owner what the cut off point is and tell you when you view the house if you ask about making an offer, again to avoid wasting time.

Ah so like women who are going through a divorce and are trying to garner as many assets for their new future as possible?

I still doubt that in reality.

Lets say a property was on for 500, and you low balled at 400.

If that property wasn't selling and you came back and said ok I will offer asking and put a non refundable deposit down of lets say 10% - there isn't a vendor out there that wouldn't snap you hand off.

If the property isnt selling and youre desperate for the money, then yes. If you tried to do that to us, you would never purchase that property. We'd live in it ourselves before we sold it to you. We'd give away before we sold it to you.

We rarely use agents but if we do, we tell them the same. If someone comes with a stupid offer, we will not hear any more offers from that person. When we are dealing with a sale ourselves, we will block people who come with low offers. They can never renegotiate.

There are plenty who would tell you to sod off. Just because it may not have happened to you doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen at all.

To be honest divorce's aren't as good as they used to be, because to fund two properties they normally need as much as they can.

Probate are by far and way the best - because I think frame of mind wise it is easy to take a hit on something that you never worked for.

For easy maths lets say there is a probate property at 750 and three kids are set to beneift.

If it sells for asking they get 250 each but if they knock say 75k off they still get their mits on 225 each - so it's negligible for them. hjtrjrt

It's because they only choose home owners who are vulnerable in some way

And after your 500K is accepted, what is the vendor had 480K in their mind as an acceptable offer?

Your approach seems to have resulted in you paying 20K more than you needed to because to didn't draw them into price discovery negotiation

Why would you turn down asking just because they started with an offer that annoyed you?