We've been asked by landlord to make an offer on the house we're renting. Is there anyway to find out its proper value as opposed to what an estate agent will value it on?

[Pernickety]

I realise that houses are only worth what people are willing to pay for them. We live in an area where larger houses are not selling. The owners are not dropping their prices. Small houses are reducing their prices. There don't seem to be the buyers out there willing to pay the prices for the bigger houses at the moment. Now, we know this. And we have tracked the market around here for 3 years (long story - took us awhile to sell our house in another area as we had to rent it out when we moved here for jobs) But our landlord lives elsewhere, in another county.

The house needs a lot of work. The man's grandmother lived here last. we know what the house is worth to us and that's all we'd be willing to pay. But given what other houses of this size are marketed at (though not selling) it's going to sound like a cheeky offer. The road hasn't had much selling activity in prior years to give an accurate comparison. Our neighbours bought in 2006 and paid slightly less than we wish to offer.

What would you do?

You are in a great position It will be so much less hassle for all concerned so offer what you think you can afford less maybe 10% an work up.

make the cheeky offer

look on nethouseprice to see any comparable sales over last year

pay for a survey

Remember that the landlord will be saving a fortune in estate agents fees

Put in your offer, if the LL thinks it's cheeky he can market at his preferred level and see what happens. Good luck.

If you apply for a mortgage they will send a valuer round to value the house and base the mortgage offer on this, which is a much more realistic valuation compared to one an estate agent would give. when we had our house valued by the mortgage co it was £30,000 less than the estate agent's. HTH

Can't you get an estate agent to come and value it - they don't know that you're not the owner. Just say you want it to be priced realistically??

Thanks everyone. We put in the offer. We have nothing to lose. If he comes back with a no and markets it at a higher amount, I don't think he will sell it.

Hi Pernickety. we managed to buy the house we were renting from our landlord a few years ago. He had the house valued by several local agents and so we went from there with our negotiations. We also used Rightmove to get an idea of recent sold prices. Ours also needs work so we did manage to knock him down by about £15k. I think we were both fairly happy with the deal in the end and was so much easier than having to find somewhere else! Just make sure you are aware of what is included in the price if you are not going through an agent as these things won't be done for you by solicitor.

Thanks for your comment. The landlord is going to get 3 estate agents in, understandably, so we'll see what happens.