Anyone fancy starting a Sellers support thread?

[Sooperswooper]

Just that really!

Hello all. Just had an open day last weekend, had 9 viewers. Got feedback from 5 - basically, very well presented, but too small, wrong location etc.
I am losing my optimism. My house is priced lower than any other comparable house and I was hoping for a quick sale.

Sorry you didn't get any offers this weekend, cat.

We've got 3 offers and the EA has advised us to ask them for last and final offers by closing time on Wednesday. So we'll see what happens. It's the three people who were obviously the most interested when they were round this weekend. We've made appointments to see all the vaguely suitable houses for us on the market at the moment, so hopefully we'll find something.

Fingers crossed for you step

I slept so badly last night.

I think it's actually the finding somewhere for us that I'm finding the most stressful part. We're going to see 6 houses today.

Apparently our best and final offers deadline is 4.30 today and then we need to decide. DH told the EA we'd get back to them by 5.30 because he's an idiot.

It is very stressful Step, I really hope you find somewhere you like today.

Apparently our buyer has changed his mind on his mortgage company so we are due another survey which can't be done for three weeks because the surveyor who covers this area is busy - not that happy about that tbh.

Had another removal firm in to quote, apparently we do need more than 3000 cubic feet of space (which the guy advised was normal in a 6 bed house ). The move will take three days, I had expected two but no, three days it is, one to pack, two to finish packing and loading and to drive half way there and three to unload.

Suddenly £3k doesn't seem so unreasonable. I will wait to see what today's firm quote but they were talking about 'export' wrapping some of my old bits of furniture whether I wanted it or not .... expect it will be more than the other one.

Step, I'm looking forward to moving just so I can have a good night's sleep- haven't had one of those since the offer came in.

Letter from solicitor today, contract has gone to the buyer, he would have got it today. Not heard anything yet. He needs to get his skates on if were still going for the 11th. Darent pack till he signs but need to pack soon. No sleep for me tonight!

Hopefully he'll hurry up. How frustrating!

Our best and final offers came in and they all came up from the original offer. Two of them are over the asking price, and come from people with no chain and finance in place. So we need to decide which one to accept.

More depressingly, we've been viewing houses today. Urgh. It was not encouraging and we've had some laughable experiences from people who really, really should be getting their EA to show people round. People who insist in demonstrating how to work a hob extractor to you (it had very standard controls), people who say they'll let you look around in your own but don't actually do that, people who tell you about all the lightbulbs in the house, people who look annoyed when they ask you if you'd prefer them to put their dogs outside and you say 'yes', people who genuinely seem to think that their house is the only one on the estate that can get fibre (it isn't). (Some vendors may have been guilty of more than one of these things).

We have more to look at on Thursday, Friday and Saturday too. One of them has to be good enough, doesn't it?

Oh step, house hunting does not sound fun. Luckily, or frustratingly, we've had my dads house to move into for the last eighteen months since he died. Can't get a mortgage to give my brother his half till ours has sold though. So near but so far!
Sure you'll find the perfect house soon.

I'm not even expecting anything close to perfect. Something detached with enough rooms, a nice big kitchen, sensible parking arrangements and inoffensive decor. We're happy to look at not-quite-so-new builds (which are definitely less popular) and we have a very healthy budget (especially for the area we live in) but the choices are pretty dire.

instead we've seen houses with tiny, tiny bedrooms, even by built in the 90s standards. Houses with parking situations that would clearly require me to start regular MN parking threads (e.g. AIBU to think that my NDN should not park his cars to block my drive and garage just because his drive and garage are further away?). Houses where the design of the (shared) drive mean that you would struggle to get your car out if your neighbour was home. And I'm not even considering the decorative horrors we've seen because you can actually fix that.

Step good luck in viewings.
I have a massive sellers remorse (sold last year to buy this house which I am now selling and wanting to move back). I think I am going to end up having a heart attack.

That is a shame Cat.

I booked my removals today (and had to pay the whole amount, gulp).

I left the county I grew up in 30 years ago and have lived on three continents, today my elderly father said of my moving back "It is a dream come true Lavender for me and your mother". Made me cry! And made the stress of moving before my house sells a bit more worthwhile.

Lavender, that is just lovely! Hope it goes smoothly for you now.

That's good news Step, but not so good about the lack of houses.

Suffolk, it didn't say why the water had failed. I rang the water board & they said they couldn't investigate further until they knew what they were looking at - fair enough.

I've been to the solicitor & provided information for all the questions asked by the buyer. Asked the solicitor if she had any ideas when we might be able to exchange on the sale of our house? She said I was getting a bit ahead of myself as the surveyor has only just been out to the house we are buying & we might end up homeless for a bit. MAkes sense I suppose but I'd rather sell & move in with family for a bit, ah well

That is really lovely, lavender. Keep focusing on that rather than the house selling.

Cat: that must be really horrible. I hope you find the right house for you.

SpongeBob: it might be premature or it might be a brilliant way of minimising the issues of chains breaking down. I was talking to the EA yesterday and she was telling me about chains with 40+ houses in them! Urgh.

We chose to accept the second highest offer we had because we felt they'd be the easiest buyers. There wasn't much in it between the offers and some of the information we had made us think the higher offer might not be such a straightforward sale. I feel a bit bad about disappointing the woman who offered, but that's me being silly and irrational and not properly seeing it as a business transaction.

When the EA told the woman she hadn't been successful, she tried to offer more! But we stuck with our decision because it's pretty shit to go to last and final offers and then allow more negotiations afterwards. The issue that caused us to reject her offer was still there anyway, but it's all a bit too gazumpy for my liking and would certainly alienate our buyers. This way we still have backup interest should things go wrong...

Wow 40 in a chain?! That's crazy! I think you're right, Step. I wouldn't trust someone who had apparently given their best & final offer then increased their offer again. & I supposed it's treating others as you'd like to be treated yourself? Although I don't think many people think like that when selling houses!

Yeah. I think it just confirmed our reasons for wariness were probably correct in the first place. But, at least, she appears to really, really want the house! The buyers we chose are also in a great position with no chain and really didn't deserve to have the best and final offers thing subverted.

The 40+ chain thing is amazing. It must have been one with lots of upsizing and downsizing going on all over the place. The EA said she was amazed it made it through to completion. Imagine the stress for all involved.

well our buyer has come back demanding quite a big reduction. We've said no and we're standing our ground. We've told her we'll put it up for rent (would go easily in this area) and sell it in a few years if she does not sort things out.

She refuses to show us the surveyors report and has instead sent the estate agent a long email with carefully chosen extracts of report but we "can't see the email either". As DP says she's paid out £800 for a report and if its persuasive enough to get us to bring the price down by £10k she'd show it to us.

Our suspicion is that the surveyor has valued the property at or about the asking price so she does not want us to see it.

We've told her either she completes quickly at asking price or we walk away. We are hoping that she decides to go for it because

a) she's paid a lot for a surveyors report
b) shes in temporary accommodation with all her stuff in storage as she's completed on her house
c) The estate agent says she obviously loves the property and is getting very emotional over it.

DP is so calm, he sees it as a business transaction and basically says she can take it or leave it

presed post too soon.

I on the other hand am a juddering wreck. DP is now in charge of negotiations, I'm not allowed anywhere near them unless to convey messages!

Lists, why can't buyers just go, yes I would like your house, I see the price would you consider taking less? No? OK let's sign then.
We had three weeks of surveyors and tradesmen for him to get £2000 off.

Contracts signed today but still no moving date. Least I dare pack now!

List: that sounds very frustrating. It isn't great how so often surveys are simply used as an excuse to renegotiate on a deal already done. Fair enough if something genuinely unexpected comes up, but trying to get money off because the survey says the window frames are rotten (for example) when this was obvious to anyone viewing and should have been factored into the offer in the first place. Hopefully she'll come through.

Good news on the contracts row. Presumably you'll have a completion date very soon, which is exciting.

We have finally managed to see a house we actually like today, but it is really quite overpriced. It's a recent new build and has been on the market for nearly 6 months (although they've just gone to two agents). Because it's a new build, you can totally compare the recent sold prices for the same model of house (some of which have sold during the time this one's been on the market) and they're a good bit lower than the asking price. The plot is not necessarily better than the ones that have been selling for less (arguably it's less desirable) and the spec and decorative condition is pretty much identical. There's no way a mortgage valuation would come in at anything like what they're asking for it. So, we're thinking about putting in an offer of what it's actually worth but we need to go back and look again (and suspect the vendors are unlikely to accept it, despite the facts being as they are).

Lists stand your ground. We were in the same position a fortnight ago and kept saying 'no'. It worked and are on the verge of exchange. We got to see the report sent to the EA. the only negative comment was something we were up front about and had be considered in the price.

step although we ate decamping to our holidy house, we are also looking to buy and have noticed that asking prices seem to be way over value. I think there is a lot of hype about a house price boom. There is so little on the market.

Yes. The lack of property on the market is a problem. Looking on rightmove (including sold stc), it appears that the sensibly priced properties locally are selling very quickly indeed. But lots of other properties are not selling at all because they are very overpriced (and sometimes both overpriced and with some serious problem that would further devalue them).

It's a bit of a sellers' market here at the moment, but without any real increase in house prices. There are lots of buyers but only at sensible prices.

Right. So those of you that were here in mid Feb will remember that I was panicking about getting no viewings, then got a full asking price offer from the second people to view our house. Hurrah, you may think.

So, fast forward 6 weeks, and we have progressed pretty much nowhere. Solicitors all instructed, Property Information Forms completed by me and the place we're buying, survey done on our purchase, mortgage offer received and sent back to our lenders 3 weeks ago. However. Our purchasers have still not even set a date for the survey on our house. Apparently this is because their mortgage lenders are being absolute bastards about the whole thing, they have a market-busting rate/offer at the moment (First Direct) and have been flooded with applications, and have told our buyers that at this point they can't even confirm a date for the survey because they're so swamped (and they want a full building survey, natch).

EA asked me what date we wanted to move. I said first week of April. He said the ball's in our court and if that's the date we want we should stick to it. But there's no way it's going to happen by then is it? They need the survey booked in, then to get their mortgage offer, then read and return it, then back with the mortgage company to sort it all out. So we could be talking bloody months from now couldn't we? I feel like we're just at the mercy of these bastard mortgage companies, and we're just stuck with it.

Obviously that should say mid Jan

I'd be very sceptical about that story luna

I don't believe anyone has a 'market busting' rate at the moment as general rates are so low there's not much room to go down by a massive amount.

I'd give the buyers a date when the survey needs to be booked by or tell them it's going back on the market.

If you got full asking price on the second viewing that shouldn't be too much of a risk.

Yeah I agree, sounds like they're delaying for some random reason. Why can't people just be honest?

I went to see a financial advisor yesterday and he's brilliant! He's sorted our survey for £250 instead of the £600 I was going to do, and he's found that if we wait until the end of March we won't have to pay our early redemption charge on our current mortgage (£4,400). That's our new bathroom paid for then!