Would you ever offer on a house before selling yours?

[Beaverfeaver]

I'm tempted as we have found dream home and things seem to be flying

We did, but we could just afford both mortgages on zero expenditure beyond absolute necessities.

No it's pointless unless you have the means to finance both

Yes, if you think your house will sell quickly do it. The market round here is total madness right now and my friend wanted a house in a very specific area and nothing was coming on the market. She had had her house valued and was told it would sell quickly. Eventually she found something she liked put in an offer, put her house on the market the next day and sold in a week.
The vendor may not take it off the market until you have sold though.

We did. Just couldn't miss out on our current house. Took 8 months to sell old house though, four months of which we were in the new one. But stressful. It did mean dc could start the new year at the new school though. And we were in a position to afford both mortgages, cash deposit etc.

I would but I am 100% my house would sell within 3 days.
It really depends on your current property. Get it valued and as EAs aound.

Yes we did, had the offer accepted and then put our house on with the same estate agents. We sold our house very quickly for a good price.
Speak to the estate agent, they will advise on the market in your area.

We did too, and as above we put our house on with the same agent. Did take some time to sell ours but luckily the vendors were happy to wait. You might as well go for it and see what happens!

I wouldn't unless you are in London or somewhere where theproerty market is booming. We found our dream home in July but waited until Nov (when we got an offer on ours) to offer on it. Fortunately it was still on the market.

You should offer so they know you are there an interested. At the very least (even if they don't accept it until you've sold) they might be reluctant to sell to anyone else at a lower price for a few weeks just to see if you can get your sale done.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Definitely! As long as you are prepared to not hold out for the absolute best price on your own. Our offer (asking price) was accepted for our current place after an open day. There were apparently 5 other offers (though always hard to know what is true), but she went for us and we sold ours ten days later. The agent reckoned that she went with us because she had a "good feeling" and had a daughter with the same name as mine! I think she could tell that I absolutely loved the place and would be extremely motivated to get exchanged as quickly as possible.
I have just put an offer in on a house (mentioned in other thread) without mine even being on the market, but have everything organised with the agent already and know he has interested private buyers.

We did, put ours on the market with the same agent (not sure that was wise) and sold ours within a month or two. We did take a low offer to get the house but also re-negotiated the price on our current home. The main downside was that I was so keen to get this house, we really got a low price for the previous one. That still rankles DH but for me, it was worth it to get this house.

We did. Had to put our own house on the market within a week though which was a bit hectic. Happens all the time, in England anyway.

We did this but it didn't end well- we put our house on the market with the same agent so they could 'hold' the house for us and get ours sold quickly. Ours took about a month to sell but then we were gazumped on the place we were buying and didn't have a chance of getting in over the other people as they were chain-free and we couldn't up our offer to match theirs.

We ended up moving somewhere else which we're very happy with but at the time it was pretty heartbreaking and I wouldn't put myself in that position again. I'd only offer on a house if I could afford to buy it without selling first.

We did, when we bought our current house. We were planning on putting ours on the market anyway, we just worked really fast and had it on within 2 days, and it had sold another 4 or 5 days after that. The people we were buying from didn't take it off the market until we had an offer on ours, which I thought was fair.

We did. Our offer wasn't accepted, but when that sale fell through they came straight back to us without re marketing. It's always good to express serious interest.

Yes I did but am in London.

Offer accepted at the start of the month, Owner gave us til the end of the month to get an offer on ours, we got one as soon as we put it on the market.
Mind you this was 2 years ago before it went insane. Now I doubt a seller would accept anything other than a wheelbarrow full of hard cash

Yes, we did (outer London 2 years ago, before things went mad). I only wanted this one house and had been waiting for it to come up for sale.

We made a deal with the vendor, through the agent, that we would pay the full asking price and he would take it off the market and give us a month to sell ours.

We went with the same agent and sold ours within a fortnight.

Everyone was happy! (And we love it here!)

Yes, and everyone thought I was nuts at the time but I managed to be very persuasive because it was our dream property. It was quite stressful though, as our property was not even on the market. I was pretty certain it would sell and quickly- as it happened I had an offer in 4 days and I was in panic mode from nerves so I slightly under sold it.

It's always good to express your interest, so yes, make the offer. Especially if you're somewhere where houses are routinely selling within days. (London? - But then I doubt the seller would accept).

As a seller though, I would accept your offer AND carry on marketing my house and if someone came along in a better position, i.e. chain free/cash buyers, etc, then I'd consider their offer over yours.

You can certainly try. As others have said, some Vendors will not take the property off the market until you are in a position to proceed though.

If I were the Vendor, I would probably say yes (depending on what was being offered of course ) just so that I didn't have to show anyone else around. It may come down to whether they need to move quickly & whether they have found somewhere they also want to be in a good position to offer on. In a very competitive market, I believe that Vendors take the circumstances of potential buyers into consideration when deciding whether to accept. The fact that someone in the chain has yet to sell might go against them - so they could be wary on those grounds.

You won't know until you try though, if it were my absolute dream house I would just have to give it a go . Good luck!

we did: but knew the place we were buying had a slower market than where we were selling (plus they had been on market for a good while so were happy for the offer and willing to wait). we did really like the new place so took an offer below recommended when we found someone ready to proceed quickly, it was worth it for us to get going. a year on and one of our friends has sold a similar place for quite a lot more BUT it was worth the relative loss as we now have just the place we wanted. so yes, make an offer as long as you are aware that to follow through you may take a hit on what you can get for your place. as long as you can afford thAt in your calculations, go for it!

Yes we did. We went on with the same agents. We had our first offer within 3 days of being on the market. We did make it very clear to the EA that we wouldn't move if we lost our purchase.

It all worked out.

We did, I wouldn't unless I was on an absolute sure footing financially or 100% certain my house would sell quickly.

A house went on the market on Friday.

I found it listed on Saturday afternoon.

Called up the estate agent and it had already sold. They had 9 other viewings arranged which they had to cancel.

I'm going to have no luck in this market!