Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Property/DIY

Join our Property forum for renovation, DIY, and house selling advice.

Original poster

Sellers roll call! How many viewings are you gettingin this stagnant market?

974 replies

Pixiedust1973 · 15/01/2018 14:45

I thought it would be nice to update each other with our progress as I seem to of lost the other sellers thread!

My house has been on the market on & off since April last year. We found a house we liked, got a buyer before putting in an offer. Had a low offer but managed to negotiate them up & the house we want down to an acceptable level, just! Turns out after many months that their buyer can't proceed so we decide to cut off from our old agents & start afresh with a 25k reduction for quick sale, making us without question the best house in the area for the price! Comparables being 40-50k higher! Im in an expensive part of Surrey btw, hence silly money for very little!

Been on 55 days now & had 11 viewings, 2 cheeky try their luck offers we can't accept because they're 30k below our asking price already reduced by 25k. Id say that given how stagnant the market is we're getting a reasonable amount of interest. Getting lots more hits online since the new year & hopefully its only a matter of time. The viewers we are getting are proceedable viewers, mainly chain free. Probably explains the low offers! Hmm Had a second viewing on Friday & awaiting their feedback today. Thought they were keen but the later in the day it gets the more nervous im getting!

OP posts:
Curiousthinker · 27/05/2018 17:06

The market definitely isn't stagnant here in Solihull. From my experience buying last year and my brother trying to buy now, houses are having multiple offers in weeks.

Onceuponatimethen · 27/05/2018 17:07

Absolutely true a house is only worth what people will pay! So at the moment these houses may not be worth near asking. But sellers don’t have to accept an offer and if they can wait can choose to do so until the market pops back up.

Onceuponatimethen · 27/05/2018 17:09

Curious that’s interesting! A few places here are also moving fast but not round us

ArcticMumkey · 27/05/2018 17:12

Hello
We have been in the market for 2 months, had 16 viewings and have dropped the price by 15k but no offers yet. Stumped as to why we've not sold, it's a desirable area due to the schools and we're detached with open space to the front and rear so not overlooked. Modern kitchen and bathroom and neutral decor. We've had an offer accepted on a house but can't proceed any further and the vendors were on a deadline of Friday to sell or they'd lose the house they want. It's a nightmare!
One viewer cancelled this week with 10 minutes notice, I'm still fuming about it.

Kamma89 · 27/05/2018 19:40

@artic 10 mins notice is so rude! What's wrong with people?! 15k is what %? Might not be a big enough drop in price. For example if you're selling at 50k it's a huge drop, not so much at 400k

I think vendors dropping by less than 5% looks silly whatever the asking price. Unless it moves you into a new searchable price bracket.

BuildingThings · 27/05/2018 19:51

@Kamma That’s very encouraging to know we’re not alone or being unreasonable. We had a similar thing to you, we told the EA before arranging the viewing that we wouldn’t be offering asking price, the agents still set up the viewing and told us that the vendor was keen to sell and then once we had offered, the feedback was that the vendor “laughed at our offer”. Wink

Anyway, I just want to say that we, as FTBs, are not trying to be rude or ‘play games’ when we offer low. We like your house so much that we would like to buy it! We’re simply trying to negotiate the best deal we can when we are making the biggest financial decision of our lives.



Also, I’m curious what is it like being on the other side, getting the ‘low offer’ from EA. How do they ‘break the news’? Are they constructive about it? Do they offer advice or a strategy to the vendor? And can we trust what they tell us about the vendors response?

MovingThisYearHopefully · 27/05/2018 19:55

I had the same thing happen last Monday Arctic. Totally infuriating because we'd kept the house nice all weekend in preparation for these people. They did end up coming this Saturday in the end & apparently like our house but need to sell their flat first. Usual thing! Hmm

ArcticMumkey · 27/05/2018 19:56

Yes it's moved us into a new bracket and we've had a flurry of interest since the drop. Just no blooming offers!

ArcticMumkey · 27/05/2018 19:57

Moving Same here! I'd spent an hour the previous night getting the place ready and I have a 2 year old and 7 month old so took some effort to keep it that way! Grrr.

MovingThisYearHopefully · 27/05/2018 22:16

I have 2 teenagers so even worse lol. Grin Blooming nightmare this is! It does seem to of picked up a bit around here tbh. We had a viewer over a few weeks back who put their house on the market in order to buy ours & got a buyer quickly, but we haven't heard a thing since then, so I'm guessing they changed their minds. We subsequently had the house we were waiting on go under offer. Fuck my life! Sad

PeabodyTheGreat · 28/05/2018 09:20

What I don’t get is how do vendors figure out what the “price” is for their house in this slow market? We went on at comparable prices to similar sold prices (albeit slightly more as our road is private, very quiet and desirable and those were on a main busy road) but nothing- we’ve dropped and still getting regular viewings but no offers. Even if we had had low offers we would get some insight into what buyers are thinking, and don’t have to accept, but nothing! Worried about dropping too much more in case we end up not selling at that and having to go lower still 😂

sausagedogsmakechipolatas · 28/05/2018 10:21

We received two offers in the same day: one full and final at £15k under asking, one £10k under. Agent was desultory about the former and negotiated an extra £5k from the latter which we accepted (for context, house was listed at £135k at that point and we needed £128k to move.)

Onceuponatimethen · 28/05/2018 11:26

I think it depends on the agent.

We’ve sold a few properties and have had agents on past sales try to pressure us to take a very low price. We have in the past (in a similarly tough market) ended up selling for over 60k more than our lowest valuation.

The latest agent said to us they wouldn’t say we need to take a very low offer when the summer is yet to start and we might well get a better one

The agents are motivated to sell the property as that’s how they get their commission.

You can never be sure an agent will put an offer exactly how you do.

Onceuponatimethen · 28/05/2018 11:27

Peabody, that’s why our agent said not to bother reducing price at the moment - he said where does that stop?!

Onceuponatimethen · 28/05/2018 11:31

Should say I don’t think ours is an FTb property this time but the last one was

GinUnicorn · 28/05/2018 13:40

Can I join this thread as a buyer? We sold and are about to exchange although ended up reducing ours by 35k to finally sell.

Finding it hard as a buyer though as where we are looking well priced places go in days and the others are overpriced and stay for months.

ohdearwhatcanthematterbee · 28/05/2018 15:17

Just accepted an offer on ours! Had 30something viewings over 3 weeks, but these were the only ones to come back for a second, and they offered just under asking price, which we’ve accepted. There was someone else who was very interested, but they’ve gone on holiday and can’t do a second viewing until next week, and I’m not going to risk losing a buyer for a possible couple of grand extra.
Typically, the house we wanted went sale agreed on Saturday!

TeamRocket · 28/05/2018 18:47

@PeabodyTheGreat we looked at similar flats in our area to get our price-however within a week of us going on, another eight two bed flats went on in our street and the two streets either side at prices which meant our £/sqft was more expensive.

Hoping to hear from the estate agent tomorrow with feedback from our Friday viewing. Haven't got any more booked in since we dropped the price but hopefully will have some after the bank hol? Keeping my fingers crossed anyway!

TeamRocket · 28/05/2018 18:47

@ohdearwhatcanthematterbee great news! Although annoying about the house you wanted

PeabodyTheGreat · 28/05/2018 20:36

@onceuponatimethen hopefully our agents strategy will lead to something soon for us!

@TeamRocket good luck for the feedback from Friday. I never appreciated before how nerve wracking it is waiting for feedback (and vow to always provide it myself in future).

I think we’re hoping once there is a bit more certainty around the direction of Brexit, things will pick up. Luckily we don’t HAVE to sell to buy, though it’s making it a good deal more expensive and we do want to sell within a couple years to pay a chunk off new mortgage.

BuildingThings · 28/05/2018 21:48

@ohdearwhatcanthematterbee that’s are great news! Congratulations! Can I ask how your asking price compare to the sold prices in the area? 



@Onceuponatimethen that’s really interesting to see it from both sides. So while an EA is pressuring the buyer to improve their offer, they may also be applying pressure on the seller to accept. Did your EA suggest you make a counter offer? Because you never know how far up you could push the initial offer!



I just hope the EA didn’t alienate our vendor and was careful about putting our offer forward.

@PeabodyI think in the current market the only people who sell, do so out of necessity and accept lower offers. The people who do not need to sell will never be happy with the price they get. It doesn’t seem to be a great time to sell.

Shinesweetfreedom · 29/05/2018 01:31

From what you have said you were attempting to buy an ex rental.
You should have a lot more choice soon as more landlords are predicted to be selling up

ArcticMumkey · 29/05/2018 10:58

Had a call from our EA and we now have 2 viewings this evening. I struggle to get too excited anymore though.Typical that I've offered to host no less than 6 children for a play date this afternoon!
Does anyone else struggle to get feedback? All our viewers seem to fall of the edge of the world shortly after leaving our house, they never ever answer the EA calls for feedback it's so rude.

Kamma89 · 29/05/2018 11:19

@Artic good luck with your viewings

I would say when I looked and didn't want to buy it was hard to give feedback that was constructive and not all negative.

When we were searching recently I'd say only about 70% of the EA's even followed up with us. Of those 70% only about half of them were interested in feedback once we'd said we weren't interested.

I thought maybe this was because the properties were so popular they didn't really care but the majority of them are still for sale. Push your EA hard.

TeamRocket · 29/05/2018 14:03

@ArcticMumkey it's more our EA who we have to chase for feedback-as soon as I contact them to see how a viewing went they have feedback from the viewing. They just don't seem to be very forthcoming with it! Good luck with the viewings the afternoon, and the play date Grin

Hilariously (not) I chased the EA today about our Friday viewing, to be told that there wasn't any feedback because the viewer didn't show up! However, we have had some direct inquiries about the flat over the weekend that they're going to get booked in to view. I'm like you though Arctic, trying not to get too hopeful