To all budding Kirsty and Phil's out there

[Missy44]

DH and I have just been to see a gorgeous house. It's a beautiful end of terrace town house. We are first time buyers, with deposit and everything in place (the last house we were trying to buy resulted in us getting guzumped on day of exxchange)

There are three of the same properties for sale in the street;

1. The house we like; End of terrace, no conservatory £189,999
2. End of terrace, with conservatory £189950
3. Mid terrace, no conservatory £184950

We would prefer a side entrance to the garden, and the kitchen is nicer so that's why we've picked the house we have. They are all about 8 years old, so no major works to be done.

Now is the fun part. We only have £184,000.

We saw the house tonight, when would be the best time to offer...tomorrow, the day after?

Should we do it in person or can we offer over the phone?

How much do you think would be acceptable to offer, bearing in mind our top price is £184,000?

Do you think we stand a chance?

Any help gratefully received!

Thanks

I'd go with a first and final offer- I am in exactly same situation (gazumped! )

It is a buyers Market- go for it

I would phone tomorrow am, confirm your position re no chain and offer £175000

have you viewed the conservatory house?

I would suggest going in at 10k below the asking price
you can always go up

get the agent to explain your buying position at the point of making the offer

if they say no then ask the agent if it was a flat no or if they had to think about it -if they are waivering offer an extra 2k, if it'a a flat no, then go back in at 184 but make it clear it is a final offer

We have everything in place because we got guzumped after we had signed our side of the exchange papers on the last house. We could afford more then though because we were exempt from stamp duty.

The house has been on the market since January, we're going to view the house with a conservatory, but I think we've already fallen in love with this house. Worried about offering on this house because the estate agent is a bit of a slick wide boy. We out in an offer on a house with him before (it wasn't even 10% under the asking price) and he laughed at us and told us to cough up more, really suspicious that he didn't even tell the vendor.

We need to find a way of being clever with the offer

Estate Agents are obliged by law to put forward all offers received to their clients (the vendors).

As Turnip says, you need to look at Zoopla or nethouseprices.com to see what houses on the street have actually sold for recently.

They don't come on the market very often usually. The last house that sold on that street that is the same size was sold September 2010 for £182,000

I'd offer 175 as someone has already said
15k under the asking price is about right and then u can go up to 180k
Don't entertain the estate agent at all - ignore whatever he says and just ask for vendor feedback ASAP
State your good position though!
I would point out why u r offering this. And if the other houses are on with a different agent say u are also interested in these and they have a conservatory which is why u would pay for the other and not this one
But I would recommend viewing the others too - u have nothing to lose

They might not come up very often but now you have three all at once! All the vendors and their agents will be worried about being layed off against each other.
Are the houses all up with different agents?
Go and see the all and tell Mr Wide Boy you are considering making an offer but will be viewing the others first.
Why not do a second viewing? Crank up the pressure/anticipation of an offer.
When you make an offer - and £175k sounds like a good starting bid - late Thursday afternoon or Friday mornings are good times - psychologically peole like to tie things up before the wekeend.
If the wide-boy smirks, just say, well, that's our offer on this house. Can you put it to the vendor. I'm interested in the other two houses too and depending on what your vendor says, I may make an offer on one of those this afternoon. So can you put it to the vendor and let me know their decision?

If it's rejected, come back quickly with an increase, maintain momentum, don't go dead/ponderous/lose interest/puzzle the vendor.
Only you know what's a realistic/acceptable price for the street. With three on the market, a discount of some kind is guaranteed (from one of the vendors anyway).
Is £180-183k a realistic finishing point after a degree of haggling?

Exactly what Greentown said.

We nearly bought a mid terrace, then a week after we offered, the end of terrace came on the market. And we pulled out and went for the end of terrace.

We regretted in the end going for the end of terrace.

Reasons were... the large external wall was water logged from ill fitting drains (we had a home buyers report and didn't come up). We wouldn't have had that with the mid terrace as either side walls weren't exposed the elements.

We had the side access to the garden... great! But, we were burgaled and people were always walking down the alley and coming into our garden! We wouldn't have had that problem at the mid terrace.

Yes, a mid terrace, your attached both sides to neighbours... but, if we had our time again... we would've stuck with the mid terrace.

Any news?

There's no news yet. Thank you all for your advice, we really appreciate it. We've decided to take greentown's advice and put our offer in closer to the end of the week - hopefully they are the kind of people that want to tie things up before the weekend.

Also we're going to see the other houses on the street so that we have more of a bargaining tool. Thanks Vickles for your advice on end of terraces, that's really something for us to consider.

If we do put an offer in on this house, I think we were thinking of offering £178,000 and then telling wide boy estate agent that if they don't accept that we are going to offer on the other house. Turniphead, thanks for your advice, we've got all our documents so i'm going to put it in a nice easy format, hopefully as a way of telling them we are serious.

I'm really crossing my fingers on this house. We've had such bad luck with houses and are currently living at home with our parents after we put our notice in on our rented flat (and then got guzumped on the house we were buying).

I'll keep you informed!

Thanks again

I would echo vickles comments, I bought a lovely house which was detached but had side access and we were burgled and had an as attempted break in from the garden. A corner house appears to be more vulnerable so do check out how much access people have alongside the potential house and how often it is used. I would never buy a house like this again as once it happens you just don't feel comfortable.

I'm interested in the last couple of comments about end of terraces being more vulnerable to break-ins. I'm sure that's true (we were broken into when we lived in an end of terrace), but to me the advantages (possibly a larger garden, or garden at the side; maybe an extra window at the side of the house (we had one in our bathroom which the mid terraces couldn't have) and neighbours on one side only) outweigh that. You can always beef up your house security if you're worried - we did, after we'd been burgled.

Just to keep you updated. We've offered £178 on the house without a conservatory as that was just beautiful inside. They didn't accept so we're putting in the same offer on the house with a conservatory. This one isn't as pretty inside as it has been rented out at the moment, but the owner has said they'll give the house a thorough clean and a fresh coat of paint inside if we buy it.

Just waiting to hear from them now

good luck...x

Good luck. Am excited for you.

Good luck!