Valuation is lower than offer, what on earth do we do?

[Grantaire]

We need to move and quickly. We are trying to work towards a exchange date of October 17th.

The house we're buying was marketed as 180-185k and we offered 180 which was accepted. Valuation is 170k.

The mortgage dude says our options are to put down more of a deposit to retain our LTV, continue and move an LTV bracket which has quite an impact on repayments or go back to the vendor and ask them to drop the price.

I am in such a tizz. This has been the most stressful time for lots of reasons and our house move has to happen for myriad reasons. I don't want to be a fool though. We've sold our house, everything was progressing well without a hitch thus far, but I'm really worried it's all going to fall through. Do we leave it to our estate agent to renegotiate? Would a sensible vendor agree to renegotiate? I'm not a chancer, we want to pay a fair price for the property and we're trying hard to make this as smooth and reasonable as possible.

I've never been in this situation before so I don't know what to do.

The EA isn't working on commission; they have a fixed fee. They haven't been down valued in 2yrs and the EA is defending his professional opinion. He was clear with us that they don't inflate prices back when we first had them value our property. He's asked for a few days to try and rectify it and will renegotiate on Tuesday if the valuer is adamant.

Good luck OP

How can the EA challenge the valuation? They aren't the client and have no contract with the mortgage co/surveyor. You as the client should be able to appeal tho.

Defending his position is all very well and good but not if you pay 10k over the valuation in order to defend his reputation. Or you loose the house because he is not willing to tell the vendors that the property has been valued at a lower price by a surveyor.

The EA has done all the ground work for the appeal and we just have to submit it. We'll know very quickly if they accept the EA's evidence. If not, the EA will start renegotiating immediately. He is sure he's right and thus far his judgement has been fair and accurate. I can see why he wants the opportunity to defend his professional opinion. I've been clear that the challenge happens immediately and if it fails, we have to renegotiate. We should know this week either way.

We've just been through this exact scenario. We could have paid a higher deposit and kept our mortgage as-was but we didn't want to, so we went back to the buyer to renegotiate. In our case there was $25k difference, so we met in the middle, each of us giving up $12,500.

From the seller's perspective, if they don't agree to negotiate, a) they will be going right back to square one with the whole process and b) will have the same issue with the next buyers, whose valuation will likely come out at the same price.

Good luck!

Also, don't pin your hopes on an appeal against the valuation (not that I think it would be a good thing if you did "win", if I'm honest.) Our seller challenged the valuation because she thought it was too low. Subsequent valuation came back at the same price point. Don't forget - the surveying/property world is a relatively small one. I can't imagine many professionals who would be willing to publicly go up against "one of their own."

I'm not pinning any hopes on anything! That's been my mantra from the outset. And as I said, I'm clear about the renegotiation. If they can't quickly and successfully challenge the valuation, I expect immediate renegotiation.

How crazy that a buyer would even consider appealing a professional surveyors valuation and want to meet the kite flying asking price set by deluded vendors and estate agents desperate to get clients signed up with them.

It's no wonder the property market is in the state it's in when there are so many gullible mugs willing to pay over the odds and throw their money away.

Sall 74, I think we will assume your best intentions and forgive that rather harsh comment assuming you have adopted the protection of the screen and have forgetten that you would most likely not say that if you were face to face with a women who is trying to find a home for her family before her husband leaves on a tour of duty abroad.

Grantaire: I hope it's all going well and you get to have some more direct communication with your vendor soon.

(How ever much we would like to kick her estate agent into the middle of next week!!)

Thank you anotherday. You're a good egg

Fingers crossed. We are about to exgange on the 10th. It's a stressy time!!