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Original poster

Aarrghhh!!!!!!!! Buying/Selling Houses!

99 replies

fio2 · 15/12/2003 12:47

Just want a bloody rant really. The people who are buying our house have a had homebuyers survey done, about 3 weeks ago. And today I have had a phonecall, well not me dh. They have just decided that there are a couple of little things that have come up on the survey. The purchaser wants to send an elctrician round because something has come up with the electrics, a corgi engineer to check the CH system (which is only 18 months old and cost us 2.5k to put in!) and apparently not all the windows open!! (they do) I asked the esatate agent to explain properly what was the actual problem is but they cant tell me in more detail. Why? I just think its really funny that they have waited 3 weeks and now have decided there are problems, hardly major are they? We have already dropped the price by 3k but they obviously want to knock more off. Why are people always like this when you are selling your house. We never do it to other people, maybe we are too soft. I just want to scream and shut his stupid little head in one of my windows that 'doesnt' open! Where do we go from her? Rant over

Ahh feel better now

OP posts:

bossykate · 18/02/2004 19:15

good luck, zebra!

Original poster

fio2 · 18/02/2004 19:25

zebra I thought you were poor like me

hope it goes well btw

OP posts:

zebra · 18/02/2004 19:34

But aren't you the Great Property Developer, Fio2?
WE can mainly afford so much because I got a big inheritance last year. Our monthly earnings have only around £850 on average until 5 weeks ago when DH finally started earning.

Original poster

fio2 · 18/02/2004 19:41

LOL zebra ...dh likes to think so, truth is we buy run down properties and do them up because its all we can afford!

OP posts:

zebra · 21/02/2004 20:32

We need advice! My dad says we "should" buy the best house in the best area we can afford. Do you agree? And if so, why?
I guess my dad reckons it's where we'll be living, so may as well go for the best we can, and it will hold its value better as an investment. What do you think?

JanH · 21/02/2004 20:53

I agree with your dad, zebra - looking at what has happened to house prices around here - we bought our terraced house 20 years ago for £24K, 4-bed "executives" were then c £60K or 2½ times, a mere extra £36K.

Ours is now probably worth £130K and the 4-beds £320K - still 2½ times, but the extra is now £190K - still 1½ times ours but utterly out of reach. If we had rented for a bit, looked around more and got established we could probably have bought a big semi at £40K 6 months later when DH had a better job. Definitely go for the best you can afford without stretching yourselves (Interest rates on the up again apparently.)

zebra · 22/02/2004 11:56

But do you think it's better to buy a decent house in an excellent area, or a wonderful house in an only "nice" area, when wonderful house will actually cost less than decent house? (Given that we can "afford" it, either way).

Our last house, in a grotty but not dismal area, went up by the same ratio as other houses, but it's still half the value of what we could have been sitting on if we had stretched to a more expensive house to begin with (even within the same area).

jampot · 22/02/2004 12:06

Excuse me for butting in but I think it's best to buy the best you can afford in an excellent area. However, it's no good moving to a house that doesn't suit your criteria. I'd set that first then look at what you can get for your money.

zebra · 22/02/2004 12:11

You're not butting in, Jampot! I'll welcome opinions from anybody.
We're looking at a house which I think the seller's are wanting too much for, but it's one of the few houses that meets all/most our needs in the "excellent" area. The question for us is, do we offer what they want, even though we think it's overpriced, because not many houses like that are in the best area... or do we hold off or look elsewhere?

There are other factors, too, we lose the house we want to buy if our current house-sale falls through, etc.

jampot · 22/02/2004 12:30

Hi Zebra - have you looked on the Land Registry website for a price indication (currently showing Oct-Dec 2003) - just a thought. I'm getting mine valued on Tuesday with view to putting on market to move to Knowle. Unfortunately house prices in Knowle are more ridiculous than Solihull but that's cos there are good schools there. On Upmystreet.com you can compare growth area by area as well. The Acorn profiles make good reading - some are hilarious. The most popular food in my housing category is dog food and red sauce!!!!!!!

JanH · 22/02/2004 12:47

Ah - see what you mean! As far as the nearly perfect house is concerned, you could try making a lower offer, but if it is unusually desirable they might get the asking price quite quickly anyway.

If the "nice" area would still be a pleasant place to live, had good schools etc, then I think I would prefer wonderful house there to a less wonderful house in the excellent area - am assuming the areas concerned are some distance apart? If they are in the same catchment area I would definitely go for a more wonderful house - you have to live in it and you spend a lot more time in the house than in the area IYKWIM.

I see your dilemma, it's really hard to decide, isn't it? I'm trying to imagine 2 houses in 2 areas like that here...in terms of sales locally, I think the area is more important than the house, but where it would be nicer to live is such a subjective thing - depends how you define "excellent" and "nice"...that's absolutely no help at all, is it, zebra? Sorry!

zebra · 22/02/2004 12:49

Yeah, Land Registry suggests the house we want to buy should be marketed for about £70k less! DH always points out that the Land Registry numbers may refer to offers that were accepted 6-9 months ago, not that house prices have really moved that much.

I'm wary of Acorn profiles because so much depends on where the geographic boundaries were drawn supposedly I just moved out of "This ACORN Type contains very large numbers of low income, elderly people living in council flats. Many are in poor health" no, actually, it was an area of ethnic & young white families with students and some old folk (everything, really) -- but the flats behind us (behind the concrete wall) were council housing for the elderly.

jampot · 22/02/2004 12:59

I've put a few letters through doors of houses I like just in case the owners are thinking of selling. Here's a little problem though..... there is a house I like which I know is being marketing from next month but is not advertised yet. Should I drop a letter through the door asking them to contact me? PS: I am not usually immoral!!!!!

JanH · 22/02/2004 13:02

I just looked at Land Registry for our postcode - the average price it shows for semis is now around the average being asked for terraced, prices are still shooting up around here - and there are only 3 detacheds so not a very helpful average!

Have you asked the estate agent about the high price? Sometimes people go against agents' advice and ask for what they think it's worth.

JanH · 22/02/2004 13:03

jampot - yes, do it! It's not immoral!

zebra · 22/02/2004 13:03

I was thinking of doing the same thing, Jampot, to any house in the neighbourhood we like the look of that we think we could afford! I don't see why you think it might be immoral. Did you come by the info that they want to sell by illicit means?

twiglett · 22/02/2004 13:06

message withdrawn

marialuisa · 22/02/2004 16:53

The leaflet thing can work. Another mum at DD's school has just got herself a great house this way.

Zebra, are you really desperate to live in this particular area or is it jut slightly nicer? 70k seems a little too much over land registry prices, even allowing for them to be 12 months out of date. Personally I'd be wary of buying a house that was at the top of my budget but still needed work, but maybe you can learn to love a yellow kitchen (or is it walls rather than units?).

Happy hunting!

zebra · 22/02/2004 17:25

The house we're looking at in the "excellent" area is a 4-bed semi, advertised for £255k. Only a few streets away, in the same postcode sector, there are lots of 4-bed terraces usually with "period features", but sometimes quite run down! currently advertising for £250-£300k because they're very close to the bus route to the Uni. The Land Registry says £150k/£162k/£174k for average price of semis selling in the last 3 quarters in the same postcode sector, so £255k, even if it's 4 bed with parking most the other semis would have been 3 bed without parking -- still seems a bit high to me.

We're looking at a similar house for £30k less, in another area, nice but staid, few students, sandwiched between the poshest houses of all in the whole city and a slightly rough area, and across from the city high school that doesn't have a good rep. I actually like the catchment primary school here slightly better than the one in the "excellent" area.

Ho hum... I guess I know which house I like best, just can't stomach paying over the odds for it! I hate the buy-to-let phenomena. Maybe I should start a thread about my money anorexia, too...

marialuisa · 22/02/2004 17:36

Hang on, do you mean you work with students and you still want to live near them???? God, I'm jaundiced. Perhaps the owners are sticking to their guns about the price because they know houses rarely come up in that area and aren't in a hurry to move? An abestos garage roof wouldn't necessarily have to be dealt with, would it? Only if you were planning to rent it out or run a business from there.

zebra · 22/02/2004 18:07

I don't go near students! I do pure research. The road this house is on is mostly old folks, actually. Bus route is a good 5-10 minute walk away! That alone deters the students, I guess.
We want to convert the asbestos-roof garage to a sun room -- or any type of living space, really. It's just a big (ugly) shed for the current owners.

marialuisa · 22/02/2004 18:33

ah, ok. I'm allowed to make students miserable, virtually in the job description, DH suffers 'cos he has to be nice to them and he's not very good at it. All the best with beating the owners down.

LIZS · 22/02/2004 18:47

hi Zebra,

On paper it does sound a bit overpriced but you'd have to take into account how easy on the road parking is (ie. the less there is the more of a premium for off road parking). Also the Land Registry figures might be skewed by the number of properties sold in that period. As winter is generally slower the average sale price might be lower than otherwise depending on how keen vendors were to sell and state/size of property and it might relate to an average of fewer properties than at other periods of the year (iyswim).

Have you consulted a surveyor yet as to the likelihood of being able to convert the garage. Have neighbouring properties done it as when my mum bought a house with similar style garage we were advised that it would become a problem if she wanted to do any work which would involve the asbestos.

Also I believe that if you don't go over 249 k you avoid the next Stamp Duty threshold.

GillW · 22/02/2004 21:00

The land registry "prices" can be a bit misleading though, as you don't actually know which properties they are based on. For where I live the average price of "terraced" houses is higher than it is for semis. Sounds odd until you realise that the "terraces" are massive georgian ones usually with at least 5 bedrooms, while the semis are mostly modern-ish 3 bedroom places.

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