If you were househunting (SE London) with a budget of £450k

[tattycoram]

What price range would you look in? Is there any point in looking at houses up to £500k or will that just be disappointing? I have no idea how close people expect to get to the asking price.

Fwiw we have only just started getting mortgage approvals, flat valuation so we're not proceedable as yet

Do look at more expensive houses - they are often overpriced and the seller will eventually take less, especially if you are in a good position to proceed. There are often not that many houses on between 500 - 530 K because no one wants to pay the increased stamp duty and if they are priced at that they often sell at 500k - A pound or so less than the increased stamp duty.

Agents often tell the seller their house is worth the top of the range money to get their business and then after a few weeks suggests a reduction if there are no nibbles.

Look on Nethouse prices or zoopla or ourproperty websites as they will show the prices houses actually sold for (although not what they were offered at) and I think on zoopla you can see the history for price reductions.

If you go and have a chat with the agent in their office they often give you the details of houses they have recently sold and will tell you what they went for and why, so you can start a kind of tracking for the area.
good luck