This might be a long one so bare (bear?) with me.
We're currently living in rented accommodation in a lovely house that we are hoping to buy. We pay £725pcm for a 4 bed/2 bath semi in a decent area (NE so still have decently priced housing!), we've had a decision in principle from the Halifax that says they would potentially lend us a quite frankly staggering amount of money - well over 100k - what we had mentally said was our 'max'.
When we took on the rental (12 months ago) the house had been on the market for around 18 months, initially at £179,950 and then dropped to offers over £172,950 it obviously hasn't sold in that time and was empty when we moved in and had been for some time. The property is mortgage free.
The estate agents have today valued it at approx the £179,950 mark, ideally DH and I had come to the figure of £170,000, based on the fact it didn't sell last time (although I understand the market may have been different then) and the fact we will save them money in estate agents fees and they will get rent right up until completion.
Is that fair? The landlord/vendors are lovely people and we're all terribly British when it comes to discussing money and i really don't want to offend them. If it was through an estate agent we'd quite possibly go in a bit lower and do the hard negotiating through them where it's a bit impersonal but it's so much more difficult face to face with people you already have some semblance of a relationship with!
Any advice?