Purplebricks

[ErickBroch]

First time buyer, some of you may have seen my previous thread (nothing exciting).

I am likely going to make an offer on a house which is up for sale with purplebricks, which is all online and we speak directly with the owner.

Has anyone done this before? It seems odd to just make an offer through an online portal and see what comes back? Is there an option to negotiate? Confused!

I haven't used them before myself, but I'm sure someone on here could provide some good advice.

What I would recommend is ringing them before setting anything in stone to get a better picture of how they work, any obligations you might have to meet, and whether they do provide options to negotiate. If they're as decent a company as they claim they should be able to answer all your questions easily and transparently!

Check out their reviews, too!

We have just sold with them and also made offers through the app. It's just like making offers on eBay really. You put in your offer and the seller will either respond accept/decline, or ask their nominated agent to contact you to discuss it. Double-check the number of zeros ;)

If they ask the agent to handle negotiations, you might be waiting a day or so or a reply, possibly via phone. If they do it themselves, you might get an answer almost straight away via the app.

You can to and fro like this for as long as you like. The one benefit for you as a buyer is that you may not have someone aggressively trying to push you up on the price -- although that does depend what their nominated agent is like.

Once an offer has been accepted, the property is marked 'under offer' until everyone's solicitor details are entered. Then it will be marked sold STC and you'll get the memorandum of sale via email (although they call it something else). This is the point when it also gets taken off Rightmove.

The post-sales system lets you talk directly to the seller which is good. Be aware though that PB don't do much to support seller/buyer once the sale is agreed so you might have to do a bit of chasing. It helps if you get a bit of a conversation going with the seller and build up a rapport with them.

HTH

Thank you so much Daisy that is beyond helpful!!! I am so grateful for your response, this helps a lot :)

Fortunately I have already built a decent rapport with the owner and we are in touch, thanks for all your advice and tips!