First time buyer help and advice please

[needyounow]

Hi, I am a first time buyer in Scotland looking for some help and advice please. My knowledge is very limited so sorry for any silly questions.

I have found a house which is ideal to what I have been looking for. It needs a bit of work electrics, polystyrene ceiling, new kitchen to name a few things. It is a 2 bed house, in a town and I will be the sole owner/person living there.

Would it be really rude and pointless to put in an offer £20,000 below asking price?

I have an agreement in principle for a mortgage, can I put in an offer based on this or do I need to have a proper mortgage offer in place?

Is there anywhere that I can look into what my average monthly bills would be or is it a complete guessing game?

Likewise is there anywhere to find out rough idea of costs for getting the electrics done etc?

Many Thanks

£20k below is nothing on a £800k house, but an awful lot on a £100k house. So depends on the % really and local market.

Don't need mortgage offer, AIP is fine.

Hi, I'm not an expert but I might be able to help a little. If you have an agreement in principle that should be enough to make an offer. The thing is if the house as other people bidding they may be less likely to want to sell to you, especially if someone is a cash buyer. However you have no chain ( no house to sell first ) so that's an advantage too.

Definitely offer below the price, all they can say is no. Our first house needed a lot of work and in the end we got it for 12,000 less after alot of bids!

If you decided to buy,your mortgage company will want a survey done on the house. ( to make sure its worth what there saying it is) That gives you some idea to the cost of repairing and then you can get other quotes if you still wanna buy .
Hope that helps.

In Scotland it's usually an offers over system. Having said that we bought a house there for £30,000 under the asking price. It had been on the market a long time and needed gutting. No one else was in competition, so it can be done.

Thanks for the replies.
Property is on market at offers over £135,000. They are definitely asking for more than Is realistic.

I am going to go and have a second viewing and make a decision from there. But I am thinking I have nothing to lose by trying, could be lucky.

That's reassuring to know I can use the AIP to put in an offer.

Thanks

You have nothing to lose but if it's on for offers over 135k, they aren't going to accept 115k!

Unless they don't get any offers above 135? Always worth an offer. They can but say no.

Offer what ever you like. They can say no. You can then up your offer if you want. No harm in putting in a cheeky offer.
What is it valued at on the Home Report?
Offers over are becoming less and less. In this market it is unusual to pay more then the property has been valued at.
In terms of the price to do the electrics, you'd need to contact relevant companies and get quotes.

How does the asking price compare to the home report value? Do you know what similar properties near buy have sold for? It is always worth a try. We got our house for 20k under valuation but was double the price of this one. Your solicitor will be able advise when you ask them to submit your offer.

Ours was up for £99,000 originally, They reduced it themselves slightly and we bought for £84,000. we even tried to reduce it again after the survey .Not everyone wants to do up an house and depends how desperate they are to sell.

The system in Scotland is one of sealed bids. At the deadline all offers are looked at and then one offer is chosen. Once the offer is accepted then it becomes a contract.
In England/Wales it is completely different Even when an offer is accepted/agreed by both parties either can lower/raise the asking price, come out the sale right until exchange of contracts.
In England/Wales the EA will tell you eg they already have an offer of £200,000,000 so you will need to go higher etc but I don't think this happens in Scotland
Really so much depends on the state of the market. Until recently prices
were rising so fast that any serious buyer would not have dared bid too low. However things seem to be changing in London and the S East for sure. I might offer 5-10k less .

It's only sealed bids in Scotland if the property goes to a closing date. This is not as common as it once was and will likely only occur often in certain very popular areas. Also once the offer is accepted it does not form a contract. Contract isn't final until missives are concluded.