Properties relisted at pre-COVID prices - are sellers in cuckoo land?

[househunter2020]

Started property search in February (London) and saw various properties quickly sold, obviously riding on post election bounce. We did not put in offer for any. Now we are seeing from this week properties that were sold get relisted at previous asking price (Jan/ Feb time). Are sellers in cuckoo land?

Just spoke to one agent about one relisting and asked if seller is reducing the price and was told oh that one was priced very well already and sold straight away last time it was listed, only now the buyer pulled out due to work problems... Of course it was February or a century ago...

I would expect about 5% reduction from previous listing. What do you think?

sorry £1,000,000

There are 3 houses on a street close to me. Same estate and very similar floorplan/ size.

House A was up for 750k in Jan and sold in Feb. Recently back to market so I assume that sale fell though.

House B had half of garage converted to a sitting room without natural light. On market in early March for 850k and has been pulled off after lockdown.

House C is similar to house B and on market today... for 900k.

I wonder what potential buys will think when they see the listings for A and C together. Or maybe the whole thing is a plot of vendor of house A?

@serenada, sorry yes, reliseted not delisted!

The house was over priced to begin with. It's actually a lovely house on a lovely road but that should tell them all they need to know.

£200k more is mental.

Deluded.

@Home2018 Can you share a link? I'd be keen to see it.

I am attempting to renegotiate my offer which I made pre covid, as I type. I sold in January and went into rented.

I have job insecurity, even if property prices don’t move much people have less money. The estate agent was reluctant to even consider that, which pissed me off.

Vendor is retired, moving to new build. Was a bit of a shock to them as they’re obviously not caught up in the financial uncertainty of it.

I don’t have any personal attachment to buying and selling as my last sale ripped my soul out. If we can’t get it to a more affordable price today/tomorrow then we have to withdraw.

@Jennyie1 if it's not absolutely necessary for you to move, i'd probably ride it out and see what happens. Not sure why the EA got into such a huff but then, it's less commission for them. God I can't stand EAs

Yep, the delusion is still very strong with many people.

The thing with the housing market though is that it is not just rooted in logical business decisions. That's the problem with using hard economic modelling to predict market movement .

One snapshot from surrey/ london borders: the largish EA who just sold our house told me yesterday that around 40% of sales agreed pre-COVID had fallen through. Within 3 weeks of lockdown ending, all but 2 of the fallen through sales had gone under offer again.

LTV is a big issue for first time buyers. Less of an issue if you are taking incremental steps up the housing ladder and have some equity built up. Ditto affordability to a lesser degree.

I will be interested to see the evidence on lending decisions in a few months' time.

I was told by an EA that the vendors of a house we want to see "want cash buyers". It's on the market for £2 million. Who has £2 million sitting around in cash?! I just laughed..
There's weirdness in the market at the moment.

I need to sell as we moved 45 miles away and I'm in temp accommodation- the price will be what it sells for, what it's worth. No cloud cuckoos involved for most sellers. Some people were in the process of selling, paused and still need to sell.

We offered on 2 houses today and both vendors expect price max 20k under their pre-covid asking. Both are in 700k-1m bracket so that’s a very small decrease and both had their asking price sales fell through because of covid.

But we got a call from one EA to view a house above our budget... EA knows our budget and says we should still see it so I hope it will be third time lucky!

Not today. We offered on two houses in past week in sequence that is..

People who can afford to buy expensive London houses are unlikely to have been the hardest hit financially by corona virus. London prices are insane and always have been.

Most buyers in our price range will be in a chain and have something to sell (we are not but that is a long story). And for every chain you need someone at the bottom either FTB or investors. Both are likely in short supply at the moment and I think that is why so many chains broke down and houses back to the market.

I am waiting to see what happens in the next 6 months when furlough ends and the harsh realities start impacting the market.

@Adjeoh

And for every chain you need someone at the bottom either FTB or investors

This is so true. No matter what incentives there are (HTB, etc) the market needs to be able to move and to do that people need to get on it in balance with those already one and who want to move up.

If FTBS can't get on and take the properties that BTL took when it was lucrative for them to do so, the market will stagnate and the middle layer will collapse. It is in everyone's interest to enable FTB getting on.

My house went on the market in feb, it never came off so why would I drop the price? How much would you suggest I drop by? The property market hasn’t crashed - it might at some point but currently it’s just a bit stagnant.

@Incrediblytired.

I am looking at one bed flats/studios. If they come to the £120,000-150,000 mark, I can afford one with (with mortgage and deposit). That's the maximum I can get mortgage wise. I think that people have to think in terms of what buyers can afford now.

I don't have any advice and I understand completely why a seller wouldn't want to reduce - you are looking at the next place you want to buy and need the sale money for that.

Incrediblytired if you’ve just a weekend full of viewings, then you probably don’t - I’ve just spent the weekend viewing and most properties had multiple viewings planned, people coming in straight after us etc. If you haven’t had that, then I’d say you’re probably overpriced for the new market. Things have changed since February. You might have to as well, unless of course you don’t actually need to sell at the moment.

I am waiting to see how viewings translate into sales. I suspect it is getting harder and people do not yet fully realise it. We offered on a house 8% under asking and EA said there are many viewings lined up next day and vendor expects pre-covid asking price given level of interest. We refused to go up and house seems still not sold yet one week on.

Banks tightening LTV must have an effect on FTBs and all those who expect to be able to offer X assuming they can sell their own house to FTB at Y.

We are in Hertfordshire and have been renting from family since lockdown as our house sale thankfully went through pre covid.

We are in no rush to buy, however I am amazed at how many houses on our "Watch List" have now sold in the past week.

One EA was "Inundated" with viewings on one and sold the house within 2 days of listing.. quiet the task when half the office are still on furlough, no idea how they managed to fit so many viewings in!

I'm nervous about two things... one unemployment and the economy - we haven't see what that looks like yet as the effects haven't been felt and two... ANOTHER BREXIT DEADLINE!!!

The government have till June 30 to extend the talks which obviously no one is paying attention to because its all eyes on COVID. Regardless of how people voted - Brexit created so much uncertainty for all.. what's the effect of that on us?

I think people will mo e quickly nowntjings have eased up incase of the fear of a second wave locking people again. Might be why there is some speed happening.

Also think houses with space and garden will not necessarily drop in price as people realise it's more valuable again incase of another lockdown.

I think it will almost be dependent a bit on the type of property, a single 1bed flat no balcony might bot do so well compared to a 1bed flat with a balcony etc.

I am just here to give a warning, as if most of you never knew anyway. The majority of posts discussing the so called "downturn on the property market" are being spammed via housepricecrash.com.

There are rental, property investors, homeowners and many many more that are swamped by this group whose one an only aim is to see distress in the property market so they can buy cheap.

As I type there is yet again another thread discussing Mumsnet and openly bragging about spreading lies on the state of the property market. I am one of the people who have a web business that is being ruined by these peoples lies through endless trolling, if you try and respond on their website and you will be banned within on minutes.

There are a few of us as we speak trying to take action against housepricecrash.com, I advice Mumsnet to do the same.

We had a “buyer” pre lockdown. We had agreed a price. His partner hadn’t seen the house and was due to come round the following week, then lockdown occurred.

Because I am quite willing to move quickly we have been looking at auctions as well as Rightmove/Zoopla.

I have seen some shockers listed on Rightmove for £125000 more than the immaculate neighbouring property that sold in November.

I have looked at auctions and to test if I was being realistic I put what I thought was realistic valuations on places. Then checked after the auction and found they went for much much more.

I.e a flat I was looking at went for nearly double the guide price and £30,000 more than my generous top hypothetical price. It meant that by the time you had done it up and extended the lease you would have been better off buying a done up place with the lease extended a few doors down.

By all accounts Zoopla say our area has risen in value 1.6%

We will stick to the price we want for ours. Although this buyer has already indicated that they might reduce their offer.
I need to buy and it doesn’t seem like many people are reducing their prices atm

I don’t think the housing market has changed that much from what we can see on rightmove. However I agree with a PP that people are probably more open to lower offers than they were.