Over offered? WWYD?

[Plus3]

Disaster. Have just done our survey & the mortgage company says our offer is too much, it needs a full structural survey, and many problems.

How annoyed as the vendor would you be? We effectively need to drop our offer by £35k...

Oh wow. That a heck of a difference. I think as the vendor would they not suspect of there was anything wrong that they would need to drop their price. Sorry. That's a real pain

Were you aware of the problems anyway? We're they obvious?

I suppose if I were your vendor whether I would accept a reduced offer would depend on a) how much interest there was initially in my property and b) whether I could move on with your reduced offer ie I didn't need a specific amount to proceed on my purchase, if I were buying somewhere else

Depends on how much interest there was in the property. Do you know if there were other interested buyers? And the circumstances of the sellers?

They might well be annoyed but you can't pay more than the house is worth. You're not messing them around for fun.

The next buyer would probably have the same problem/issues - negotiating after a such survey is normal. Also what is the value of the price £35k on a £700k isn't much after all...

This happened when I bought my first flat - I offered, mortgage company said flat wasn't worth that so I went back via the estate agent and revised my offer. Offer was accepted because the next buyer would have had the same issues and I was a first time buyer, mortgage in place etc etc.

Yes, as everyone else has said it depends on a few factors.

What price did you offer? Is £35k a huge amount in relation to the asking price?

When you viewed, were any of the "many" jobs apparent? For example, did you see clear signs of damp anywhere?

Also, how hard it would be for the Vendor to find another buyer at the price he/she wants. This will probably depend on how long the house has been on the market & how many viewings there have been during that time.

Did you offer the full asking price (just out of interest). If so, the Vendor may feel that a 'deal' has already been done & be unwilling to reduce further. Although, they may ultimately have to as surely a new Buyer would face the same issues.....

Thanks everyone - the house didn't look as if there was anything wrong, but the extension hasn't been done right, along with a few other thing. We offered just under the asking price of £350k & they said they priced it to sell - it was about £40k cheaper than everything else we had looked at, but put this down to location (which we were aware that we were compromising on....)

I know they have found their next property, and were keen to be done and dusted by Christmas.

Ah, right, OK. I would instruct my solicitor to forward a copy of my survey - with the mortgage company's valuation clearly highlighted, along with the recommendation for a full survey & the problems with the extension highlighted - and see what the Vendors say to that.

This should prove that you actually cannot proceed at the agreed price (presumably, as the lenders would not agree to the mortgage) & the fact that a basic survey has highlighted so much (when they generally highlight very little). They will be able to see that it is not just you regretting not making a lower offer & being a bit cheeky.

Do you want out as the house has so many problems, or would you still take it for the right price?

If they"priced to sell " I think they may have known/had an inkling that there were going to be problems. Get the EA to go back with a realistic offer good luck

I wouldn't give them the complete survey only the back page which gives you the surveyor's valuation.

Remember it is one person's (albeit an expert) opinion.

Would you be willing to meet somewhere in the middle as that's probably what the vendors may eventually offer.

If it was put up for sale for £40,000 under market value, and your survey revealed about £35,000 of work, I would imagine you are therefore paying the right amount for the house and the survey is confirming that.

What am I missing?

It wasn't £40k under market value - just that this particular house was cheaper than others in the same sort of area. Houses on that road have generally gone for £15k less than our offer - but the survey has revealed several problems that reduces the price further.

OP I don't want to be picky but this particular house was cheaper than others in the same sort of area - that means it was for sale at less than market value.

The Vendors may well know it needed some money spent on it so priced it to reflect that. Which means they may not be at all keen to drop the price.

Anyway, good luck with it. I hope you get something sorted out.

It's alright I don't think you are being picky - the cold hard facts for us are that the mortgage company have stated that it is overvalued, there have been some significant structural issues raised that further lower the value.
Location counts, and on the face of it it seemed as this was the reason for the lower price. This is not on a good road hence the lower asking price (or so we assumed)

My feeling is that they weren't anticipating any problems with the survey - they seemed surprised that we were doing a homebuyer's

Can you make it work at the higher price? If not, then it's a moot point, surely.

Yes, it's sad for the vendor to have to either accept a lower price, or go back to the market, but that's the reality of buying and selling houses.

You can make a lower offer, and they can reject it if it doesn't work for them.

It would be likely that there only option to get asking price is a cash buyer. Although someone else may value the property for more than your mortgage company I cannot imagine it will be near the offer they accepted.

I think it's perfectly acceptable to lower your offer after survey and would show them the relevant parts of the report. It isn't fair to drag it out though and gazunder close to exchange which is what happened to us. It was very difficult and upsetting. As others have said what has come up on your survey will come up on others so I imagine that they will be amenable. Good luck.

Hi. I sold a house for £450,000 and told the buyers that there was damp and that was factored into the price. They still came back with a survey saying there was damp (tell me something I don't know) and wanted £50,000 off the price as a result of the survey. Now that was cheeky as we had told them. In the end we negotiated and sold for somewhere around £429,000.

The point is I knew they were being cheeky, but they had a survey to say there was a problem, and we wanted to sell enough. I didn't walk away.

The issue is whether your buyers will feel the same, can afford to take the hit, or are willing to meet you in the middle.

As an aside our buyers sold the house again 2 years later having spent about £35,000 on it. They sold it for £590,000 ish. So they were in some ways right to buy without knocking the full £50,000 off. This is post crash and everyone including us was ok with this, as a house is worth what someone will or can pay. It sounds like you can't cover this cost even if you wanted to, and if so that needs to be in the price.

oh and I have no regrets as moving allowed me to get my forever house and we wanted a house to live in, not to make money from