Listing, viewings and offers thread 3!

[Fortheloveofscience]

We filled up our old one, hoping I'm not posting out of turn by starting the next, it's the only thing keeping me from going nuts with the endless cycle of no viewings - viewings - feedback - no offer - no viewings - viewings etc!

Hope this is the thread where we all sell and get our dream houses. I'm working from home and doing 'backseat cleaning' - nagging my poor OH who has the day off to do everything for our second viewing this afternoon from the only couple to have shown serious interest.

Good luck poochie, sounds stressful!

We haven't heard from our solicitor in a month and a half. We have to get an engineer's report and a new map and all sorts. It's so stressful when you don't hear from them!

Got costing from our managing agent for the leasehold pack - as it's an apartment we have to get the agent to provide certain info to the buyer's solicitor. So thought I'd get in touch with the agent to check the cost and add it to the spreadsheet - it's £360! And the best bit is that they've said that this should answer 'most' of the common questions. Erm, why not all for that price? Any additional questions will be costed separately but they can't tell me how much because it will depend on what they are

That's very expensive Paul! Seems really exploitative when you've got no choice but to pay it.

It seems crazy that things go quiet for so long, we're not at that stage yet but I'd be going nuts at 6 weeks with no contact, and I can't see why a survey would take 3 weeks.

So our FTB second viewers have decided they don't like the house's location after all and aren't going to offer . Back to no viewings and no realistic leads, and after 21 viewings I'm more than a bit fed up. If things don't pick up after the election I don't know what we'll do...

We have a second viewing tomorrow and an offer (sort of!!) The viewers who loved it Saturday have offered 10k under the asking price , we declined, they have now come back with a provisional asking price offer but they need to go back to the mortgage company and get it confirmed. Fingers crossed!!

Congratulations Emma - fingers crossed you get full asking price (or more - you could be in for a bidding war!)

We've just had an offer of £90k under the asking price.
I can't decide whether to laugh or be really insulted. We're planning on reducing it to £599k from £625k. Their offer was £535k. That's way less than we can afford and even though I know a house is only worth what someone will pay for it, i think it's definitely very cheeky. Why do people come and view when it's clearly too expensive for them? DH is away at the moment so we can't even discuss it.

My solicitor and her assistant are on holiday. And I had an email to say enquiries had been raised... please can someone settle my nerves and give me some reassuring words.

Five if it makes you feel any better we have just had the same type of offer. 625 which is 11% under asking. We’re going to decline. We feel the house is really very reasonably priced considering similar properties in the area. EA has said to hold tight for another couple of weeks and that we should make asking or near to it. If you know your property is worth more than the offer then hold tight – how long have you been on the market? You may find that reducing the price to 599 will give you a lot more viewings.

I was holding it together but now I’m just totally downhearted after this low offer. We really want to move on and sell this house. One of those days, too much going on. Gah!

Party you're right it does get you downhearted but keep the faith as it will all work out in the end (that's what I'm telling myself). We've found a house we like which puts the pressure on aswell.
Our buyer clearly likes it so hopefully they offer more. Has your person upped their offer at all?

Science oh what a palaver! I know it's a big decision and you need to get it right, but with Google Streetview and the whole wealth of information that you can find online, I'm struggling to see how you'd get to a second viewing and then decide the area wasn't right? We've already done a general drive round the areas that we're interested in, ruled out the bits and streets that we don't want. If they're serious about buying then why don't they do the research before going to view?

Yes I thought the pack price was rather expensive, but there are no rules governing what they can charge so we have no choice unfortunately. The good thing though is that once we've paid for it, it can be used again if a buyer drops out and someone else steps in.

The other good thing is that when we hopefully manage to find a buyer, we notify the agent and they'll prepare the pack straightaway so that we can pass it to our solicitor ready for when the other side need it. I think lots of agent's won't prepare in advance and insist on waiting until the solicitor requests it - and only then do they start to prepare stuff, which is why leasehold conveyancing transactions normally take longer than freehold. So at least this way it might save a couple of weeks on the legal side.

Seems so ridiculous people think its ok to offer so low under the asking price.

beckyb am sure it'll be fine. Surely there is someone covering your solicitor whilst they are away though?

Am sat here in floods of tears. No offers and the sellers of the house we are buying have got interest and are going to book in more viewings on the 19th unless ours sells by then. I don't know what more we can do.

Koalas that is so disappointing. Fingers crossed no-one else will like it as much as you.

Oh Koalas lovely, it's truly shit. But if you lose it then there's nothing you can do - and there will be other houses.

I know that there's a school of thought which says that if you aren't embarrassed by your first offer then you're being too generous, but I think that has to be balanced out with knowing what the market is like in that area. If the house that you're interested in is priced fairly compared to other houses in your target area which are going for FAP, then why waste time and piss the vendors off by going in with stupid UAP offers?

I don't get it. Surely the time for cheeky offers is when something is massively overpriced compared to others, or needs a shed-load of work doing to it, or it's been sat on the market with no price reduction for 12 months plus?

Ahh found the dreammm house and it's not in a chain. We still haven't sold our place though. Is it any worth offering still? It's on for 680k, would 655k be an ok first offer?

Rainsbow - you can try but don't be surprised if the agent refuses to stop marketing it Best case scenario is that they may agree to take it down for a certain period of time subject to you selling - but that if you haven't at the end of that time then it will go on again. If the house is likely to be popular and you aren't in a proceedable position then lots of agents won't even entertain the offer. We did this on our dream place, but lost out because we've not sold and they found another buyer who was in a proceedable position. Frustrating!

The photographer just turned up and asked to do all the exterior shots! Errr....no! So he's coming back tomorrow. We'll have time to basically cut the grass and tidy up and weeds out the front but definitely no time to paint the window sills. He assured us it wouldn't really register from that distance.

Actually he ended up being quite helpful. We were talking about scheduling interior photos next week and he came inside and said "get rid of this, but don't bother with that, we can just shove it over there out of frame". The less work the better!

Oh and when DH showed some paintwork he hadn't gotten round to touching up "Don't worry, I'll Photoshop it"

Attended the auction prior to ours this morning - a couple of houses went for 100,00 and 150,000 above asking! It was amazing! That could be me! (Of course some others didn't reach reserve and were withdrawn but we won't think about that).

Another ten viewings booked in!! 43 viewings in less than 3 weeks. Here's to an offer by Saturday

Wow thats great Rainsbow

Fancy sending any my way??!

Had 2 viewings this week ( totalling 4 in 4 months)

Had a dilemma over lights. Are you meant to switch them all on in daytime like a show home? It feels really fake!

That's amazing Rainbow. Surely you must get an offer from those.

jazxmin I don't know. I never do as was worried it would look like the house was dark and i was trying to hide it by putting the lights on. Maybe that is what I'm doing wrong...

We have a viewing tomorrow!
That will be number 10 in 8 weeks.
We've had more internal photos taken.
Kebab man has not been back in touch after DH texted him. 😠
Fingers crossed though this viewer doesn't even have his house on the market 🙁

@jazzmin - I would switch the lights on unless it's raging sunlight. And if it was then put on ambient lighting like lamps. We did that with ours and think it did help!

We viewed a house at 7pm today - still daylight and they had the lamp on in the hall which gave If a really nice homely feel. Yet every other light in the whole house was switched off and tbh it made the house feel a bit cramped and dreary. Plus it wasn't that light so they were kind of sitting around in semi-darkness which was weird.
DH has fallen in love with a 1920s house that needs a fair bit of work in terms of damp, carpets, walls, kitchen, bathroom and top end of our budget - bit overwhelmed despite the fact I want a bit of a project. I'm viewing 3 others that are about 40k cheaper and needing less work so hoping we fall in love with one of them.

Annoyingly our mortgage company are now saying that due to me rotating to a new NHS trust after my maternity (despite same job, 3yr contract provided, both on 30% better pay than when we got our mortgage and continuos employment) they won't let us port as it's a 'new job'. Which will mean paying 4K in ERCs out of our deposit pot - so frustrating! I hate banks.

Poochie that sounds bloody annoying.

Jazz I agree, unless the room is very bright already then switch side lamps on. I don't tend to put 'big' lights on unless it's in the hallway.

Sooo, last night was interesting! Hopefully some news will land today on a govt being formed, which will also hopefully mean that everyone settles down and the market picks up again. I have everything crossed that we might get some interest now. I'm going to give it until Thurs next week and if there's still no news, have a conversation with the agent about what we're going to do.