Best time of year to buy?

[clubnail]

Is there a best time of year to start looking for a house? Do lots of people put their houses on the market after Christmas? We have been looking for a while and think we are going to make an offer on the only nice one we've seen - we like it a lot, but it doesn't feel perfect. But we've been looking for a few months and it is the nicest within budget in that time. I'd love to be in by Christmas, but am wondering if we should wait it out and see if a glut of new offerings appear in the new year ... or just buy this place as maybe nothing nicer will come up anyway.

Not sure about others but we are going up for sale and waiting until the end of Jan/ Feb. My thinking is that if the house doesn't sell during November then I do not want people in the house during December with all the Xmas tat everywhere. There's also sweet F.A. on the market that I want to buy at the moment. I think a lot do hold off until the new year.

Traditionally "country houses" go on the market in the Spring, so thats the best time to see a large selection of houses, but the best time to get a bargain would be when there are fewer buyers and house sales are at their lowest ie over Xmas period.

My estate agent says that houses are cheaper in the winter because of the poor lighting makes them look drab and harder to sell so sellers reduce the price because they want to get moving.

He says never buy a house in may/june/july because the summer weather, lovely flowers, open windows etc make buyers see a house in an idilic way and they often end up offering more money than if they bought any other time of year.

If you love the house in the winter then you should love it all year round. If you love it in the summer then you may be disapointed in the winter.

I hate my house all year round so im never disappointed

potty, lol! :) Hope you grow to love your house, or can move!

Ok, thanks for the replies. The house has already been reduced, I think it's a good price. Just so so hard to know if we should just buy, or wait, and risk losing this one for the price it's at. Or we buy now, and see a better one in the new year and be kicking ourselves. Argh.

Thanks clubnail, I will never grow to love this house. Ive been here 18 years and I hate it even more as each year passes. My husband bought this house with his ex to bring up 'their family' in, she disappeared and I moved in as he was 'definately only staying 6 months then moving as far away as possible'.......still here. But good luck with your house hunt

Op we're in about the same position, there is nothing on the market where we are, we sold our house in 4 days and have had an offer accepted on the only house in the area that we liked. It's not what we set out to find. I'm not sure if we should wait or not, as like you said you then run the risk of losing this one. We do really like it, it's just hard to tell if it's the best when there's hardly anything to compare to!
But I'm looking at it as though it's 'meant to be'
It's under our budget too so we can get everything done that needs doing which is a bonus! We may even have enough left over for a buy to let, so this is swinging us quite a lot!
So hard to know what to do!

If you like it buy it and stop looking. If you don't then walk away and try and forget about it. I've read loads of people who walk away from 1st property and regret it because they don't find anything as nice. I still dream of a different house but timing on selling ours just didn't work out...!

If you aren't 100% then wait. If we sell and there's nothing on the market we want to but we will be renting. I'm so fussy about it though as we are applying for senior school for dd next year so catchment will be a priority also. We have an Edwardian house currently and whilst it's a very characterful property I hate the cold draughty place and can't wait for a smaller cosy place - hey op do you want to but it?!

So sorry, I don't know why I didn't see these responses until now.

Potty, gosh, that is a long time to not like a home. I think you should move!

Mule, how are things progressing? Well, I hope. ickle and Flossie, well, decision got made for us as someone bid a decent offer that we weren't ready to match, so that one got sold. Have now seen another property we like heaps more, so for us, it was worth waiting, as it has shown us that there are other properties here coming up, and this one is really so much better than the first one - it ticks all the boxes that were missing on that first one. Things are very slow here though and only this one fitting our requirements has come up since my last post at the end of October. Viewing again soon then we will make an offer! Unless Flossie sells me her Edwardian house first!