Does anyone have experience of part exchange/offers available...

[randomcatname]

or help to buy?

There's a new development being built nearby that I'd discounted because we want to reduce our monthly payments as much as we can so thought we'd go for something far cheaper that's in need of extensive work.

But having had a quick look online and factoring in how much we'd have to spend to get the cheap place up to spec, I'm wondering if it's worth it. We're downsizing and want to capitalise on that, so I have reservations about part exchange.

Would really appreciate your experiences. I've never considered a modern home before. TIA.

You will get a better deal off a developer if you don't part exchange.

Unless the developers are absolutely desperate to get rid of the last couple of house, with part exchange they'll very often offer a lowish amount for your house and then refuse to discount the list price for the new house. At least that's what happened to us when we looked into part exchange. The developers offered us £230k for our house (which we could have sold ourselves for over £250k) and then wanted £420k for a house that they actually sold for £370k to other people (who presumably didn't part exchange).

If you sell your house yourself then you can negotiate much harder on the price of the new one. If the houses are already built but not sold they may be more desperate to get rid of them than if it's off plan. This is especially likely if they've already done all the flooring and tiling (rather than you choosing it yourself). They also are more open to negotiation at the end of their financial year, when they want to shift houses to make the books look better.

Remember that the price off plan generally won't include flooring and loads of other stuff. IME the developers charge you extra for all sorts of stupid stuff, and you have to pay that with cash not rolled into the purchase price. Some of them charge extra for white paint instead of magnolia, for example.

Also, my friend who did buy off the developer who offered us a hideous deal, had so, so many problems with snagging that they're still trying to resolve. So it isn't necessarily the low stress no hassle option it appears.

That's really useful to hear, thank you. I suspected as much. My friend had the same problem with the white paint option too. Not exactly super friendly customer service, is it? I'll mosey over to the site at the weekend to get a feel for things.

Have they just started building the site, or would buying one that's been up for a couple of years be an option?

That's can be a much better deal with new builds than buying off plan. Not only can you properly see the house itself, and where it is in relation to other houses (it can be really hard to see what it'll actually be like from the plans), but it will have flooring and the sellers will already have had to pay extra for outside taps, anything other than the absolute basic kitchen, more than 3 tiles in each bathroom and such like. And they'll have dealt with the snagging too.

We're buying a house on the estate where the developer was taking the piss with the part exchange. It was built in 2008 (right at the start of the development, which they're still not finished) and is £50k cheaper than the starting prices for the same house type off plan on the other side of the development. That means we can actually change everything we want to and still not come close to what a brand new one would cost us. (Incidentally, we got a lot more for our house than the developer was offering too, so it's nearly £100k of difference in total).

I'm glad it worked out so well for you! It's a new development, only about half the houses are up and people are living in them. They seem to be selling really quickly but there are a lot still to come so maybe they'll drop in price as time goes by. That's a really good point actually, I hadn't considered that. The annoying thing is the 3 beds are all sold and the prices are offline atm, so I'll have to go to speak to them and that's when they get their claws on you. We're really clear that we want to reduce our mortgage payments though so there's only so far we can go.