Is this an insulting offer?

[macneil]

Have fallen for a house in the north of England in a university city. It's on the market for £275,000. Last year the buyer paid £230,000. They have sanded the floorboards and decorated it beautifully, but done no structural work. The estate agent says house prices haven't gone up all that much in the last year. The thing is, we just can't afford it, especially as going over £250,000 means stamp duty of at least £7,000, over £8,000 at £275,000. They haven't had any other offers. But if we make an offer at £249,999, will they hate us so much they wouldn't take a bigger offer? The absolute most we can afford (and basically this would mean eating nothing but rice for the rest of our lives) is £260,000. Would it be smarter to say 'We've spoken to the bank and this is absolutely our top offer, we understand if you can't take it' first of all. Or do we take a risk and try the £249,999? Does anyone have any idea how the house market is going at the moment?

[thehairybabysmum]

Theres a good running club...Knavesmire Harriers for your DH...v. friendly.

Also the racecourse fab for running, in fact york great for running as its flat!! (not that im lazy!)

[LucyJones]

ooh can I ask you guys a quick question?
How much is stamp duty?
Our maximum price we are looking for at the moment is 250k and I'm a bit of a novice at all this as neverdone it before

[heifer]

this website works out stamp duty for you - tis great

[LucyJones]

oh brilliant, thanks So do you add that to the mortgage or do you have to pay it in one go?

[heifer]

we have always paid it ourselves - but I guess if you don't have the cash you could add it to your mortgage (assuming you are not having a 100% already)

[thehairybabysmum]

you pay it to the solicitor (who then forwards it to the tax people i guess), not sure you could add it to the mortgage or not though. For houses between 125 and 250k it's 1% of the asking price.

[macneil]

Those Holgate houses are lovely. I'm going to send my dad, but I think the problem is that we're not looking for a proper family home because we may only stay there as long as 2 years, so can't really cope with a proper project, and will also need to let it out for months at a time, so need something that would appeal to tourists - that's the other main reason, apart from being unadventurous, that we were going for a very close place. But Holgate appears to be AS close in as Bootham, definitely. Unfortunately, we can't go back up for a while now, so I'm at the mercy of my dad's eye for a house.