Reducing offer after survey?

[Bellatrix257]

We are FTB and had an offer accepted soon after house came on market for just 2% under asking- we had originally been keen to get a bargain but we didn’t want to mess around when this one came in as we thought it was in very good condition and DP is so fussy and he really liked it (our offer is a lot higher than most recently sold house so I’m a bit resentful but I think this reflects the condition and slightly larger room sizes, and we didn’t want to lose the house). The seller specifically said as they were hoping for full asking price they will not reduce the price after survey. We agreed to this but said if something very serious and urgent were to come up we would ask for a reduction.

A few things came up in survey and I’m wondering whether this might warrant us asking for £1000 ish off our offer dependant on trade quotes, or whether you think after they specifically said they would not reduce, we’d be wasting our time and risk offending them. (We are absolutely maxing out for this house so had hoped that we’d need no urgent repairs - it’s an old house so we expect to pay maintainence over the years but after we move in we will have very little spare cash so any reduction will be helpful)

These are the repairs listed in survey that came back urgent (level 3):

The ones I’m worried about:

• defective bay window flat roof needs replaced or repaired

-‘the ground level adjoining walls to the rear elevation is too high and not the required 150mm below the damp proof course level. In addition the original air bricks may possibly have been covered over. Consequently, the rear living room does not appear to be properly ventilated. The ground levels should be reduced; and surfaces relaid as necessary. The sub floor ventilation provision should also be improved’

The ones that probably aren’t a big deal:

• blocked drain (sorry if I’m being stupid and that’s a very easy fix)
• no fire alarm or CO alarm
• no safety or toughened glass in some of the windows so they need replaced (don’t have children yet so would probably do this before children)
• no safety certificates for any services but hopefully lawyer will sort that out

The market valuation came back exactly the same as our offer (which is strange as it was right to the £100 so I wonder if they always just put the offer unless it’s way off?)

Thanks so much for any advice!!

scaryteacher a vendor should expect to sell the property at market value for its condition and location, NOT what they need for their next move. It's ridiculous to think you buy a house for the amount the vendor needs. I'd be selling for a a house in Leeds for a million if I wanted my next property to be in E1.

I think it's fair to revise your offer to be £X, providing Y and Z are rectified. Flat roof and air bricks are acceptable rectification works to ensure the house is in good structural order. Smoke alarms, toughened glass etc aren't requirements, so you can't ask to have them rectified.

It's certainly how we proceeded with negotiations. Offered £X pending g survey. Survey threw up a leaky flat roof and something else. We'd standby the offer providing the 2 issues were fixed. All was done.

I always assume I'm going to replace smoke detectors anyway.

@scaryteacher I didn’t say I expected a bargain. I just originally wanted to get something on the cheaper side in worse condition but we changed our minds and are now paying a premium for somethnung in good condition, so I’m a bit iffy about if these works are going to cost a lot.

I completely agree with @ToBeClear. We’ve worked and saved extremely hard, while renting, to buy a big enough house that will do us for the next 20 years, not to ‘get on the ladder’, wait for our property’s price to inflate after doing very little work, then buying a bigger house, waiting for the same to happen, until we can then afford a bigger house. This is what previous generations have done. But we know this cycle cannot continue so we are completely maxing out to buy our big family house now as we know that the housing ladder is not as it used to be. It will probably go down in value over the next few years if anything but we need somewhere to live. Why should we pay for someone’s ‘next move’ when they’ve already benefited from housing in a way we never will? (Even though we definitely are right now paying much much much higher than what they bought it for)

I overheard someone the other day in their 50s I think say ‘goodness they’re getting a 30 year mortgage at £700 a month can you believe it? It would make you put off having children’- ours is a longer term and more expensive and hearing that made me worry but then I realised in their generation it was much easier to get on the housing ladder and people did just make big gains in order to move up. They also don’t realise we’d be paying that in rent at least for the rest of our lifetime as will all our generation if we don’t buy something now.

I am in no way expecting to be able to move to a better house just based on my house gaining value- I’m just expecting that if we want a better house at some point we’re going to have to save really hard again to get a bigger deposit , along with hopefully equity that we’ve paid off so I agree it’s completely ridiculous to expect your buyers to pay for you to get a bigger house.

Correction to above, all first floor or higher windows less than a certain distance above ground level need to have safety glass, but I think that only applies to windows installed after a certain date for fensa certification.

With a knackered bay roof and poor subfloor ventilation combined with a potentially bridged damp course, you're looking at the possibility of major damp issues and potential rot. House next door to us recently sold, with these issues. Visually pristine. New neighbours have had extensive work done, including repairing joists with dry rot. £1000 probably didn't touch it. £1000 is probably the bay plus piddly jobs.

a house that needed re-roofing would be priced accordingly, not at the price it would be if it had already been re-roofed

Don't bank on it. Ours needed complete reroofing. The vendors hadn't even tried to paint over all the watermarks. The price did not reflect that, though.

@Bellatrix257 . Our homebuyers survey valuation was the same as our mortgage valuation (done by Santander) and it was the same as the asking price for the house.

My friends dad used to be a surveyor and he told me that they will only tell you different if they think it is worth less than what you have offered/will be paying. Hope all goes well for you!

@ToBeClear The EA are being arses at the moment, I don't trust them as far as I can throw them. In fairness, the damp proof quote has been done by a family friend, and that's at full price for a "normal" customer - in reality, he isn't going to charge us that much :)

Bellatrix Your OP states very clearly that you wanted ' a bargain' (not a house in poor condition), and that you are 'resentful' at paying just under full asking. If you are willing to pay that, then that is what the house is worth to you.

FYI, house price inflation has been steadily upwards for decades. I've just looked on Zoopla at my grandparent old house which my Mum sold in 1979/80 for under £15k iirc. It is now worth in excess of £205k.

A house I sold in 1992 for £88k last sold in 2010 for £267k, so you will benefit just as much as anyone else in the long term.

ToBeClear a vendor should expect to sell the property at market value for its condition and location, NOT what they need for their next move The house will be priced to get them what they need for the next move, otherwise why not just give the house away? Unless it's a probate sale, a repossession, or perhaps a divorce, there will always be an element of pricing it to fund the next house purchase.

When we sold the house mentioned above in 1992, we almost didn't sell as it was stretching us too far for the next house, and the buyer kept wanting a reduction, and the EA kept pushing us, as they were sorting the mortgage for the buyer. In the end, I told the EA that the 'only an extra £15 per month on the mortgage' if we sold at the price they wanted, would be the difference between my eating or not (it wasn't, but I was talking to a mendacious EA), and as I didn't have to sell, I would withdraw the house from sale. I got the price I needed.

scaryteacher precisely that - if the market price for condition and location doesn't allow you to buy the next house you want, then don't sell. No one is entitled to 'move up the ladder' and ask for what they 'need' as opposed to what it is worth.

@scaryteacher sorry for misunderstanding; I meant I originally wanted something in poor condition that we could add value to ourselves.

ToBeClear Not quite true - if it's a sellers market then people can ask what they want/need for a property, just as they do for cars, designer clothes etc. Whether they get it or not is a different matter to the sale price they can choose to put on their property.

My ex NDNs had theirs on for £250k for a long time. I wouldn't have paid that as there was no central heating as such, just night storage heaters and a wood burner. The access to the property is over my drive, and the rooms weren't that big. They had it on at that price for 15 months, and got full asking.