The decluttering, cleaning, vacating, pandering, nailbiting antics of the stressed out house sellers continued...

[CuddyMum]

Thought I'd better start a new thread... :)

Conditions lifted on ours - sale final, and sold sign going up today

I had a second viewing today. Think it went fairly well. Brought his parents with them. They were here for a good 40 mins and its not a massive house. Spent all yesterday cleaning, I have a massive stress headache now.

Still no viewers. Been on right move since Thurs night.

I am impatient!

Good stuff always - is that all legal now? Not sure how it all works in Canada.

I got up at 7.30 am to clean the whole house and mow the lawns as our buyers were coming to look at the fixtures and fittings. The house was immaculate and the sun was shining brightly! I had to run the kids into town so I put the dog in the car too and let husband deal with it all. They were only here for 20 mins and were talking about dates etc. I do hope they still like the house! We are still awaiting for our sellers solicitors to write to ours - I know the vendor had returned his paperwork to them - wish they'd hurry up so the searches can take place.

Good day..... I think. The agent showed two couples round yesterday afternoon. The first couple spoke to the agent today to check we are definitely leaving shed and asked her to ring them on Monday as they are keen to have a bit more of a think about money but did say they really liked the house!

We've also found something we like. We tried to arrange to view but it has a tenant in it who isn't allowing viewings despite it being in the agreement and let on short term basis because owner told them he is selling. They move out in June.

The agent told me 'we've got loads of people interested and could sell it 10 times over if we could offer viewings' which I don't think is true as it was on market all last summer and didn't sell. They've reduced the price a bit but still..... Sounds like EA nonsense to me?

Good luck Tricken. Sounds promising.

Don't worry wirecat. The weather has been so nice after its been awful for so long I reckon everyone is out rather than surfing rightmove.

No weekend viewings booked here and nothing new to view...
Our EA met with us today and said the market seems to be about a month slower than normal. Maybe due to the weather.
Still lots of interest in our house, apparently, but people unwilling to booking viewings until they've got buyers. Does this sound plausible?

I'd love to move before the end of the summer, but I'm beginning to wonder if it'll happen at all!

Yes turnip. I think that's plausible. It used to be a case of lots of viewings from people who aren't even on the market. I think people are aware now that it can be really hard to sell so don't see point in getting their hopes up viewing?

Its been a beautiful day and no viewings. The house we have offered on is still on the market though.

Yes, I started thinking I wasn't going to look at anything until we had sold ours, because I wasn't convinced it was going to happen.

Cuddy, yep, all legal. Contracts get signed v early here as soon as the solicitors have checked all the paperwork, survey done etc, and deposits paid. So if our buyers back out now, they forfeit their deposit (about $25k) and we can sue for breach of contract. We did manage to change dates so our sale and purchase match up

Dh fed up of me looking at houzz for interior design ideas...

Good luck tomorrow weveryone - may the sun shine, and buyers smile on you!

Oh Sailorsgal - I know how disappointing it can be when it's a beautiful day, just perfect for a viewing. It will happen for you soon.

Always - that's great - sounds like a good system over there. When is your purchase definite?

I've been looking on the Internet for ideas for my new home - my husband is fed up with me too.

We had another second viewing today on ours - haven't heard anything yet though. We saw another bungalow which might be an alternative to our preferred property. We should find out next week if the vendor is prepared to wait for us to find another buyer or wants to put propert back on the market. I would honestly quite understand if he felt the need to do this .

We are both finding the process very hard. My dh has set his heart on us achieving a certain price but all the viewers are saying that it needs too much work and are offering correspondingly less. My dh is adamant that we should hold out for his amount but I can see us still being in this position months down the line .......................................
Unfortunately, we bought 6 years ago when prices were much higher so will definitely sell at a loss whatever we do.

The alternative is to remain here for another 6 years and plough money into this house so it retains it's value. Our plan is to downsize to reduce our mortgage and monthly outgoings. Any thoughts?

Dog - I'm reminded every day by DH that I've "given the house away". We bought 5 years ago and spent too much on a huge loft conversion and kitchen and flooring etc. and have sold for a big loss. You may get lucky but I know what you mean about still being in the same position months later as I've been there. The only thing I can suggest is to ensure that you try to get a good deal when you buy. I just want to move into my new house now and enjoy living there and making any improvements/changes to the decor for me and not for others.

It's so lovely to talk to you, CM, because you so obviously understand our dilemma . Dh and I have reached an impasse: he won't consider selling for less then £325,000 whereas I think that £315,000 is probably more realistic. I suppose I just need to hope that someone views and offers the upper amount!!

I look at our current house and I struggle to see it as 'home' now. My mother keeps telling me to do things here (new kitchen / boiler / painting etc) because it's our family home but I'm finding it hard to motivate myself to even think about any of this - especially when it would mean no holidays etc for the next few years. The whole point of the move would be to release capital in the house so our quality of life would be improved. ....................

Another weekend with no viewings for us either. EA of one of the houses we liked phoned to see how we were doing as they have three more viewings lined up for their property - had to say there was no sign we'd be in a position to make an offer anytime soon.
Doglover - difficult decision for you. I don't think we would attempt to sell right now if we didn't need to relocate. The market seems completely flat. We bought this house 10 years ago a a low point in the cycle and even so considering what we spent on doing it up we are only just breaking even if we get our asking price. I would probably hang on if I didn't have to move, but if you do need to move then holding out for asking price is probably not a good idea, although I can understand how your DH feels.

My dh thinks we should hold out for his figure and my mother thinks we should 'weather the financial storm' and sell in a few years. None of us have a crystal ball, I know, but I can't see things dramatically improving in the housing market in the foreseeable future. Grrrr ...............

Thanks, MT. All opinions welcome.

Dog, we've lost about £55k on this sale. There are no guarantees that the market is going to bounce back to when we purchased even in the next 5 years, and there is no way we can afford to do the improvements (we already have granite countertops and hardwood floors etc, we would be looking at high end appliances that we can't afford and would be giving away.) there is no space for conversions or extensions...

This move will mean we will be paying out essentially the same per month, but in a much bigger place where the kids and dogs have a garden, and we have enough space to live - the kids will be able to have people over, have a room each, and there will be somewhere we can sit in peace without being three feet away from a bunch of loud Tweens and teens playing on the wii... And we can get a trampoline to lock Ds on when he needs exercise .

We thought about it quite hard - £55k is a lot of money to essentially erase - it means that all the mortgage payments we have made over the last six years have essentially been erased - but the benefits are enough for us to suck it up.

Given that we had actually thought that we wouldn't be able to sell this place at all (lots of similar on paper cheaper properties locally - we are curiously high priced until you see the location and comparisons!) we were just so grateful to be able to shift it. We were only intending to live here for 6 months due to the size, so two years has been a long time, and the kids are even bigger now!! We originally bought it as a rental that we could move into when we relocated for a short period. It would be a good rental property, and just big enough for us to use whilst we sorted out jobs and schools, and looked for a family home. It's been pretty good to us, and I will be a little sorry to leave it, but it really isn't big enough.

That said... Last year, when we gave up on the idea of selling, we got rid of all of our spare furniture. Like, all of it. We gave it away, we sold a bit for peanuts, we took our entire spare 3 piece suite to the dump (couldn't get anyone to take it second hand as it was an import with diff fire regs, no so charities or anyone would take it) and now we are moving into a much bigger place with only a 2 bed teeny tiny apartment worth of furniture...

We are backing onto the mountain, though. So my view out of the back door onto the patio will be almost identical to here, just on the other side of the valley. So it will 'feel' the same.

Dog - we had the same dilemma, chose to take the drop so we could move, our theory being that the houses we look at will also have dropped and we'd get a bigger house for less money than 6 years ago. It is gutting though. Depends on how much you want to/need to move

Well, we'd be downsizing (currently 4 bed / 5 rec to 3 bed / 2 rec) in an attempt to reduce mortgage and monthly outgoings. We're looking to buy at about £240,000 and use about 20k to renovate.

I REALLY want to do this. Dh can't stomach our 35k loss on this property. My reasoning is that we would need to spend at 20k doing-up here in order to sell in the future

Another week gone by but no viewings. Like turnip, the EA has said this month has been very very slow.... So fed up as its looks like we will lose the house we want.

Is there a "bugger bugger bugger" emotion!

I quite understand, IIYOM! So wish there was

You need to sit down and work out the maths.

Look at the next two years - calculate your mortgage payments, renovations etc for the current property in order to sell at what dh envisages will be acceptable.

Look at a move at your 35k 'loss' price and work out your costs for the next 2 years.

Compare.

No one is going to be making money, honestly. If you can't afford your current outgoings and need to reduce them, then is it possible to remortgage to achieve this? Tis keeping the bigger house?

You're absolutely right, ALFW. Communication between dh and I is somewhat strained at the moment and I'm struggling to do the maths!! I'll see if I can persuade him to look at the figures tomorrow - there's no way he'll agree to it now!! Many thanks again.

Dog - I'm the number cruncher in the house thankfully. If it was up to my husband we'd still be waiting for our interested party to sell (which is never going to happen) and even if they did there's no guarantee they would offer anymore.